Open cluster M39

Another clear, cool, dry night and I just had to go out for a look but decided to just bring binoculars with me. I went on a hunting expedition for the open cluster M39. It is a bit north of Deneb so I followed a couple of small chains of stars to Pi1 and Pi2 Cyg and Rho Cyg. M39 was obvious in the middle of these three fairly bright stars. I was able to spot the three markers with unaided vision, but not M39. It was a pretty obvious sight, well separated from the rest of the milky way in this region. I was even able to convince myself that the bright patch of milky way near Deneb looked like North America. It looked fairly decent to unaided vision but dissappeared into the rest of the milky way through 7x50's. I just stretched out on a deck lounge chair and admired the view for the most part. Capricornus eventually peeked out from behind the tree along with Jupiter but I didn't see anything that looked like M30. I quit and went back inside about 10:00 just after spotting a mag 4 satellite headed NW near the zenith. I tracked it until it dissappeared over the house and quit for the night.