Clouds

Astronomers hate clouds!  They get in the way of being able to look at the sky at night for the beautiful celestial objects we love to observe, like the Moon, Planets, Star Clusters, Galaxies, and Nebulae.  We had an observing session a week ago and the sky was clear for an hour or two, but the weather forecast clouds at around 10 PM.  So, right on time, the clouds came in.  But it was OK because we had observed for a couple of hours.  But then I took a second look at the clouds and realized how beautiful they were.  So this photograph was taken at night.  It is a long exposure on a tripod.  The problem is that long exposures at night can make the image appear that it was taken during the day! The only clue that it is not a daytime photograph is the presence of the planet Jupiter at the top left in the photograph.  And then if you enlarge the photo by clicking on it, you will see on the right side of the photo a small dot which is the planet Saturn!  So we saw the night sky, and then we saw beautiful clouds!