A response to “View from the vicarage” by Chris Coates

This month’s Link magazine arrived with a message from Chris Coates, parish vicar. In it he applauds St George as someone who made the ultimate sacrifice by standing up for what he believed in. He then makes the following statement:

M98, M99, M100: Spiral galaxies of the Virgo Cluster

These observations came from 27th April. In addition to observing Ms 98 to 100, which I haven’t sketched previously, I viewed M85, a lenticular galaxy, which I have.

Royal Wedding views

I surprised myself by enjoying the Royal Wedding greatly (especially choice of music- was singing along to the Parry bits) and even shed a tear or two during the vows, but the thing that mildly spoilt it for me was when those Anglican bishops opened their mouths.

More spring doubles, M61, M49 and M5

On 24th beautifully clear dark skies had me outside once more looking at spring doubles as the sky darkened, and then a couple of Messier galaxies and best best globular cluster of them all.

Porrima (Gamma Virginis), Saturn and Hyperion

I’ve a lot of astronomical observations from the last week or so to catch up with. On 22nd April I was out in quite poor conditions and so looked at Saturn and a double star before the cloud rolled in.

The Voyager Spacecraft Golden Record

What will survive of the Earth and human civilization when the Earth is no longer here? Our interstellar space probes may. On board the Voyager spacecraft is this message and the Golden Record.

Review of “Humanism: an Introduction” by Jim Herrick

Humanism, an Introduction is a small (100 page) tome designed to make clear to the uninitiated what Humanism is all about. The book is divided into 13 fairly small chapters, which each make good reading at a single sitting.

Woodland walks: Mulgrave Woods and Goathland

Mulgrave woods, right out the back of Sandsend, is a privately owned pair of steepsided valleys worked for its timber, but beautifully cared-for and open to the public at the weekend and on Wednesdays (except in May, which is a shame). We had a lovely couple of days there; the flora was exceptional.

Cliff-top walks on the Cleveland Way

We managed a couple of shortish cliff-top walks on our holiday; one north from Robin Hood’s Bay and one around the Sandsend Trail.

Sandsend beach

We’ve been on holiday for the past week at Sandsend on the coast near Whitby. I have several posts on our experiences to come, but I’ll start with some general views of where we stayed and some beach finds.