After two weeks of cloud we finally had a few hours of clear skies and I was able to get the scope out again.
Alignment etc. all went fine, no problems with slow slewing speeds or anything. We had some half-decent seeing, so like Bruce Springsteen at Wembley the night before I ditched my original plan and spent an hour viewing Saturn. Although it's quite low down in the SE sky, I actually had some decent views with the f6.3 focal reducer and the 9mm eyepiece (calculated magnification using the reducer x163). I could easily make out the Cassini division and with the eye of faith two belts on the planet itself. I also thought once or twice I could see the Encke Gap, but this may have been wishful thinking! Tried adding a x2 Barlow to the equation, but Saturn wouldn't take that much magnification.
I spent half an hour looking at the open cluster M29 in Cygnus. Had some beautiful views of pin point stars. The cluster reminds me of a mini "Big Dipper". Swapping to a higher power increased the contrast and I thought I could make out some nebulosity within the cluster. Cloud then shut down operations. But a satisfactory few hours. And at least it was warm and I wasn't freezing to death. Still needed dew heater on corrector though.
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