Last evening, about 10:30, I saw Uranus for the first time. I was using my 10 inch dob telescope with a 17mm eyepiece. The sky was amazing. It literally looked like black velvet with diamonds. Uranus is hanging in the East/South-East sky just under the constellation Pisces.

Uranus is the 7th planet from the sun and the 3rd largest. It was discovered in 1781. It is 1.6 billion miles from earth and, the best I can figure, it takes the light over two minutes to reach us.

I had been looking for it through my 120mm refractor the night before but with no joy. It was very exciting to see another part of our solar system. So far, I have been able to view Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus. Neptune is next on my list. I doubt I will ever see Pluto (I still consider it a planet) or Earth.

Know that what I saw was nothing like the above image. It was more like this - small but had a beautiful bluish hue. Oh the glory of God in creation!