What a pleasant summer-evening surprise.
Last night, I stepped out on the back porch to check something before bed, and lo and behold, there to greet my eye was a remarkably beautiful celestial event! A gorgeous half-moon was setting in the southwestern sky, with a brilliant Jupiter glowing to the lower right. It was very pretty.
Though I was about to go to bed, I dashed back in to get my binoculars and observe the moons of Jupiter. Though the mighty, gas-giant has thousand of moons, I would be observing the ones that are most easily visible from earth: The Galilean moons. These four moons, Callisto, Europa, Ganymede and Io, were first observed by Galileo , circa 1610, and his observation gave him the revolutionary idea ( pun intended) that the earth went round the sun.
As for my observation, I enjoy observing the Galilean moons because they change position every night just like they did for Galileo.
And I can tell people I saw five moons last night!
copyright 2018 Christopher Donahue