" wrote:

Thanks for the tips on locating Saturn.

It took a couple of tries, but I finally found it low in the horizon
directly east of our house which faces east.

It was pretty magnificent looking, even in this cheap telescope we are
using at the moment!

Before I located Saturn I fixed on a yellowish/redish looking star
that I thought was a planet. This star was north of Orions belt. It
was really bright looking and I thought it looked like a planet in the
scope, but according to a sky chart I looked at there was no planet in
that location last night.

Anyone have a guess what that object may have been?

A little tip when requesting this sort of information:

Your exact location and the exact date and time (preferably UT) are
of premier importance. Everything in the heavens is on the move,
constantly. And a distance in degrees to the object from a known
object also helps. The object you saw was most probably Betelgeuse,
Alpha Orion. At about the same distance South of Orion's belt you
will see Rigel. Orion is a good place to start locating stars. Off
to the side are Sirius (brightest star in the sky) and Procyon.
Further north from Betelgeuse are the Twins Castor and Pollux and off
to the other side is the Pleiades and Alpha Taurus, Aldebaran.

Eugene L Griessel

Overpopulation: When people take leave of their census.