August 12, 2017

So on this night, I went out and wow! I could see so much, the sky was so clear, the stars were so pretty! My pictures were such poor quality, though, and I just wish you could see it exactly how I could!

The brightest stars I could see were: Altair, Sinistra, Arcturus, Vega, and Omega Capricorni

I did, this time, make an effort to see where the planets were in the sky. Saturn and Jupiter were the only planets above the horizon, but I could not see it and I didn't have my telescope with me. But SkyView showed me where the other planets were, and even where the Hubble Telescope was!

Something I found really neat was that I was able to see a constellation - Sagittarius. So on my phone, I drew out the shape of the stars I could see, and... it matched the constellation on my app! I started with the 5 stars and drew a "house" and then added on whatever else I could see afterwards. See how well I did below...

Since I have really poor images, I'll just insert some SkyView screenshots below.

  

   

Saturn and Jupiter, above the horizon

(horizon = red line)

  

Venus, Mercury, and Hubble Telescope, below horizon

   

Mars and the Sun!

This day was a big looking-at-the-sky day because I also got up way to early ☺ to see the sunrise and also watched the sunset. The water from the lake made it especially gorgeous this night, but unfortunately it was so cloudy in the morning I could barely see anything. Here are a few shots!

sunrise

sunset

July 27, 2017

Wow, I’m just getting back from looking outside and it was a much better success than last time! I saw so many stars - I tried to count them to report on, but it was impossible!

I was out from 10:40 to 10:55 pm, facing west, and once again used the guide of my SkyView App.

The three brightest stars I could see from my backyard were:

• Arcturus, part of the constellation Bootes (directly in front of me)
• Vega, part of the constellation Lyra (above my head)
• Kaus Australis, part of the constellation Sagittarius (to my left)

Arcturus                                                                                 Vega

Kaus Australi

I also saw the three stars that make up the handle of the Big Dipper, as well as the top two of the bowl - the bottom two were covered by the trees. The picture below shows the three stars in the handle: Alkaid, Mizar, and Alioth. The Big Dipper is part of Ursa Major.

Unfortunately, I didn’t look for the planets - whoops, that was a mistake on my part for it not even crossing my mind (I guess I was so absorbed in the beauty and magic of the stars!).

Tonight was a really great experience for me, looking up and seeing what stars I could find. The ight was beautiful: bright specks splattered across the dark sky 

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Around 8:30 pm, I looked out and could see the moon - a waxing crescent - right in the crevice between some trees. The pictures aren’t great, but I’ll feature some below.