Well, Stella and I managed to catch a brief – a VERY brief! – glimpse of Mercury and the Moon shining together in the sky above Kendal last night. The clouds were basically taking the p, coming and going exactly where the Moon and Mercury were, while the rest of the sky was wonderfully clear… finally the scythe-thin crescent Moon popped into view, and Mercury was right there beneath it, as predicted. I managed to centre Mercury in my 4.5″ ‘scope for a couple of minutes, but to be honest it wasn’t that impressive, just a slightly brighter star than it looked in the binoculars, but by then it was a triumph to actually just get it in the eyepiece…!
Soon after the clouds rolled over the pair, so we packed up and went home. But halfway back the clouds thought it woule be reeeeally funny to part fora few moments and let the Moon shine through. It looked stunning, with the “earthshine” clearly visible, and with the sky a bit darker the pinprick stars of the Pleiades cluster were visible nearby, too. No Mercury tho, that was still behind the cloud.
We didn’t manage to get any photos, but the Eddington Astronomical Society’s Treasurer, David Allan, managed to take this fine shot…
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