Venus in Ocracoke

The picture was taken with our old Kodak EasyShare camera that we have been dragging around on vacation for the past several years. Not the best quality pic but a great little camera for family vacations, just point and shoot.

Mercury was also visible through binoculars. Pretty cool seeing three planets in the sky (Mercury and Venus in the West, Jupiter in the East).

I only took my binoculars with us, but I wish I had taken my small telescope. The sky in Ocracoke is very dark and there were several nights that the veiwing was spectacular through binoculars, I bet it would be amazing though even a small scope.

The last several weeks the summer air has been really thick and humid.  Last night there were a few clouds but the air was very still and clear.

The moon was bright and I was able to see some good details with the binoculars.  Juptier has been the brightest object in the sky the past few weeks (besides the moon) and through the binoculars I was able to pick out three of the Galilean moons.  I was actually pretty surprised that I was able to see them with our moon being so bright and close.

I have been looking a Jupiter through the Nexstar 60 scope for the last couple weeks, before I went in I was wishing I had brought out the new Celestron C8 SGT, since it was so clear.

I spent better than an hour scanning the sky – lots of stars and a very clear.  I had hoped to see a meteor or 2 from the Perseid shower, but no such luck.  It will be later when I get home tonight so I will probably spend some time looking for meteors.