Had my second really decent session with the new 12" Dob since I got it last night. Despite being very cold, about 1 deg by 9pm and wet (the hairdryer was being used a lot last night!), I managed to knock 7 Messier objects of my list.
M83 Big spiral near Corvus, really impressive in a bigger scope, despite it being low was still able to get some spiral structure. Bright compact, almost stellar core.
M68 Moderate sized Globn in Hydra not fair from M83
M72 This is a really faint small globular in Aquarius, very easy to miss.
M73 Even harder to see than M72 very small V shaped asterism in Aquarius. Total mag is 9.0, only really possible to see with averted vision even with the 12"
M71 Glob in Sagitta. Nice easy glob, fairly bright.
M27 Damn this is huge! The famous Dumbell Nebula. Bright large planetary. Took up nearly half the FOV in a 25mm EP. Glorious sight!
M57. The famous Ring Nebula. Quite small but clearly round. Easy to locate in southern part of Lyra. Will get more power on it when I get better seeing to try and detect the "hole" in the ring!
All around a great night with a bigger scope. Only have 19 more Messiers to document and I have the 100 that can be seen from Vic. And that includes some (M31, M42, M43, M33) that I have observed, just haven't written up in the log yet.
