Star gazing - singular

So a cloudy day cleared just at dusk to provide a beautiful clear sky.  However, I did not get Dobby out to the front yard until 11pm, and by then the Moon was behind the trees and Saturn was down behind the neighbour's roof.  The sky above was relatively empty as well, with all the familiar constellations (Scorpio, Sagitarius, Centaurus, Crux) down behind our roofline and the tree.
So left with nothing much else to look at, and missing the dark sky I've now tasted, I aimlessly wandered the 30mm and 25mm eps around the sky before deciding to try a close up look at the brightest star above me at that moment.

Turns out that star is Achernar, the brightest star in the constellation of Eridanus ("The river") which is a winding line of stars that I will need some practice and some darker skies before I can be confident that I can pick it out.  Achernar is 'the star at the end of the river'.

Achernar is the tenth brightest star in the southern sky, a bright blue giant, which wiki reports to be a binary -  although I could not find a companion as I played with my new eyepieces trying to up the magnification.

Didn't stay out too long, but making progress on learning the constellations.

First Winter night

1 June 2012 2315 - 0030

Melbourne suburbia.

A beautiful clear night, but with a very bright waxing gibbous moon high in the sky adding to the general light pollution of the city.  And cold, very cold - but not the coldest it will get later in Winter!

Checked out the moon first.  Very bright - dazzling through the scope even using the cover with the hole exposed.  Looked for the volcanic crater that I read about in the Sky and Telescope mag recently, but no joy.

Then moved to Saturn.  Beautiful views of the plant and rings.  One small point of light to the left of the planet possibly a moon.  

Then to Alpha Centauri, very bright and was able to make out the binary system.

Beta Centauri was noticeably a much colder bluer colour.

Found some nice looking open clusters in Scorpio, and spotted an interest trio (plus one?) of very faint, but very red stars.  Very pretty.

Then casting about in Sagittarius stumbled across a fuzzy.  Looking closer and trying to block out any extra light by cupping my hands around the eyepiece, I could make it out better.

At first I thought it could be a galaxy, but looking a bit longer and better it seemed more like a cluster.  Skyeye on the phone helped and I'm sure it was M75.  A tight Globular Cluster some 65,700 LY away.

M75 (Image copied from Wikipedia)

On that success, packed up and back into the warm house.