Observing Log for Mike Durkin1/11/2007 about 4:45PM-5:15PM New York City, NY Transparency: 8/10, seeing: ?/10 about 40 degrees Naked eye and 10x50 binoculars Managed to break away from work and went to a park just outside next to the West Side Highway to try to find Comet McNaught. The sky was mostly clear, but wouldn't you know there was a bunch of wispy clouds on the western horizon where the comet was supposed to be. I tried to find the comet, however all I was able to originally make out were some strange looking dark clouds, which I think were the contrails left by jets. Soon I was able to see Venus naked eye. After about 20 minutes I was about to give up, when I finally spotted the comet. A very bright nucleus in 10x50 binoculars and once I was able to find in binoculars, it was easy to find naked eye as an inconspicuous bright dot against the clouds. I also thought that the nucleus of the comet almost looked like it was artifical or man-made light. Maybe because it was so bright, and as one other AOS club member commented, "The coma shone with an intense golden-yellow color". I was also able to make out a tail of about 30-60 arc minutes in length. I'm sure without all the clouds it would have appeared longer.
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