Observing

NGC 2419 appears as a faint globular cluster in Lynx, though in reality it’s a massive and luminous object that’s a distant outlier of our Milky Way Galaxy.

The Horsehead Nebula is a small dark nebula in the constellation Orion. Resembling a horse’s head is located just to the south of Alnitak, the easternmost star of Orion’s Belt. Nearby, the Flame Nebula appears like its name in astrophotos.

Messier 67 is an ancient open cluster in the southern, equatorial half of Cancer. It was discovered by Johann Gottfried Koehler in 1779. It is a truly ancient cluster, with some astronomers calculating that it’s as old as five billion years!

The observing year comes to a close with a bang as brilliant Jupiter comes to opposition on 7 December. Across the whole of the month the dominant gas giant planet offers its best observing circumstances of the year.

Brilliant and beautiful Venus is an increasingly conspicuous sight soon after sunset.