Tonight was amazing! I saw the Milky Way for the first time ever! I went out at 9:45pm with a lawn chair. I looked up for about 20 minutes for my eyes to get dark adapted. Then I challenged myself to find the faintest magnitude star I could see. After a few minutes of looking, I found a magnitude 5.3 star near Vega. Surprised, I kept looking up. Then I saw the faint glow of the spiral arm of our galaxy. It was incredible! It started at Deneb, around 40-45* high, and stretched across the southern sky above Altair. There were noticeably bright patches below Deneb, and to the right of Altair. I did my best blocking the nearby street light from entering my eyes. I stared up at it for a long time. When I was ready to call it a night because the moon was rising, I got up and saw the distinct glow of the Milky Way stretch across the sky from about 40* up. It was probably one of the clearest and best nights I have seen, and I was stunned that I could see the Milky Way from an orange zone in the suburbs.
