I found that my observing skills improved rapidly and dramatically when I started putting in a lot of telescope time. I enjoyed every object, though, truthfully, star clusters, both open and globular, were the real prizes. Brighter open clusters especially are hardly affected by bright skies at all. Sure, many galaxies didn't look like much. But it was interesting to see what details I could tease out of them despite the light pollution.
Visual astronomy is at least partly imagination all the time and from anywhere.
Even in the city, there was beauty in it, beauty that haunted my dreams long after my faithful little scope was packed away. Last modified June 5, 2000.