Mercury-Venus-Saturn conjunction

Hi all!

This morning I bought a pair of Pentax 8x40 PCF WP's from my favourite
camera store. I will use it to following the dance of the planets over
the coming days.

I have a pair of Nikon 10x50's mounted on a Manfrotto tripod for more
serious stuff, not mentioning the Meade 10" Dob. The latter doesn't get
much light lately.

I bought the 8x40's for R1470 =~ $217. Amazon sells them for $120 -
almost double! That is the difference in price you pay for living in
South Africa!

As can be expected, this winter's first cold front is passing by today -
all clouds and no sky!

Fortunately I saw the planets on Saturday night - Merc-Venus was at 4
degr. separation, Venus-Saturn at 8 degrees.

My plan is to keep the 8x40's at the office and/or in my car, so I can
take them out wherever/whenever I need to take a peek at whatever is
visible. I also expect to use them for game-watching, etc.

I will report back later on their optics.

Regards
Vic

--
25° 45' S
28° 12' E
GMT+2

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Arnold wrote:

Fortunately I saw the planets on Saturday night - Merc-Venus was at 4
degr. separation, Venus-Saturn at 8 degrees.

Finally got a look Thursday night. The 3 planets are below the
treetops from where I live by the time it gets dark enough to see them.
I managed to get away to a hilltop last night an hour after
sunset. The limiting magnitude to the west was approximately
zero, so I could just barely make out Saturn and Mercury by
naked eye after I had found them in binoculars. The group was
in a bent line, each of Saturn and Mercury appeared approximately
3 degrees from Venus. Saturn appeared yellow, Venus white, and
Mercury orange. The colors may be an artifact of the sky I
was looking through. A pretty sight.

--
Glenn Holliday

Very pretty sight tonight in 10x50s from Central Florida.