Date & Time: April 23, 2009 20:45 EDT
Location: Tuckahoe State Park, MD
Sky: Clear, light wind
Seeing: Bad (1/5) Transparency: Excellent
Equipment: 25cm Newtonian f/6 with 9.7mm Plossl

Notes: Springtime is always the best time to get a look at Mercury during an evening appearance. About an hour after sunset while waiting for the sky to darken at Star Gaze XV the messenger planet was easy to spot about 10 degrees above the horizon. As usual there was little more than a phase to be discerned in the eyepiece, the combination of turbulent seeing (Saturn barely showed any global detail when viewed) and low altitude wrecking havoc with the image. At the moments of semi-steady seeing it appeared to be at just past dichotomy, a very fat crescent.

Saturn Apr 17 2009

Date & Time: April 17, 2009 21:45 EDT

Location: Towson, MD

Sky: Clear, little wind

Seeing: Steady, 7/10 Transparency: Good

Equipment: 25cm Newtonian f/6 with 9.7mm Plossl

Notes: Saturn's "ears" have returned, the ring system closed up sufficiently to make it look like a knitting needle is spiked through the planet - I can barely detect space between the rings and the limb. Riding reasonably high in Leo's hind quarters the seeing is pretty good and I can definitely make out a southern equatorial belt as a subtle but distinct feature. The northern counterpart is less well defined and offers a fuzzier border with the equatorial zone which is clearly the lightest part of the orb.

Titan is the brightest moon preceding the planet by multiple radii; to the north of it is a fainter star that is probably Iapetus. Another moon (Dione?) precedes the planet as well but is much closer to the rings while a fourth moon (Rhea) hangs just north of the trailing ansa.