Just returning from our local dark sky sight Green River State Wildlife Area near Dixon, IL...WOW..hands down one of my greatest deep field viewing sessions of my entire observing life! To you folks west of the Mississippi this may be a common place, but for us; 'under the jet streamers', seeing this portion of the sky in spring in our region is very difficult due to weather conditions, but conditions were nearly ideal for several hours. Galaxies were EVERYWHERE..and many displaying great amounts detail. The show stopper was the Coma cluster. A river of galaxies, of varying brightness, design, and orientation leading to a giant pond of galaxies that resembled the Hubble deep field image. Easily 10-12 bright galaxies (many with detail) in a nearly one degree field (21Ethos)..and many more visible with averted vision. It was nearly impossible not to see at least one galaxy while panning from Leo, through Coma, south to Virgo, and ending in Corvus. At 2am though a wicked north eastern wind picked up ushering in clouds and COLD temps... The camper's furnace ran continuously extinguishing all its fuel by 6am. 7am saw cold rain..Not fun for packing..but it was WELL WORTH it!

Due to its remote nature, galaxy viewing is one of my favorite telescopic pastimes.