Friday, January 9, 2015

Stargazing

With the boat at anchor, we often get fabulous views of the nighttime sky.  The conditions on Bonaire are not as good as on some other islands, because there are bright lights all along the shoreline.  But we still see lots of stars and planets.

Last night was especially interesting, because we had three planets all aligned vertically.  At the top of the row was Mars, directly below that was Venus, and closest to the horizon was Mercury.   You don't often see three planets aligned like this.

We were also interested in the sky because a comet is approaching the sun, and this is just about the time you might begin to see it with the naked eye.  The comet is generally in the vicinity of Orion.  Here's a link to information on where to look:  Comet Lovejoy.  We didn't see the comet last night (because of the light pollution, I guess), but we'll keep trying.


"Stargazer" is also the name of a fish, found in Florida and in the Gulf of Mexico.  It is a seriously weird looking creature:



There are quite a few very odd-shaped fish in the world!

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