On a chilly May morning (9C) there was quite a large crowd (100+) as the Observatory opened at 5.00am. Fuelled by the free coffee and croissants, we got lovely views of the four planets, as well as three of the Jovian moons, in the north-eastern sky. The observatory staff had also set up a number of other telescopes, and had lots of pairs of binoculars on hand as well, so everyone was able to have a good look. And, rather fortuitously, the police closed the Harbour Bridge to traffic at about 5.15am (a would-be suicide, I gather), so the Observatory was unusually quiet with the lack of any noise from vehicles.
I only found out about this after you posted, but it would have been cool to see; I went to the Wellington observatory in 1994 to see the Shoemaker impact. Just saw last night’s coverage on TV - perhaps you were there!
The grouping of the planets is still there. Just look low in the eastern sky about 30 minutes before local sunrise. It’s actually kind of neat to watch as the planets shift position over the next few days, too. They are relatively easy to pick out with the unaided eye, but even moderate binoculars will improve the view.
They would not be set up pre-dawn, usually, but many local observatories have open-house type events on at least a monthly basis, so you should check it out. At many of these events where I have attended, there are dozens of amateur astronomers with their home-built and commercial telescopes set up to look at whatever interesting objects are in view at the time.
The shifting positions of the four Galilean moons of Jupiter is fascinating to watch night-to-night, or even hour-to-hour. Even binoculars or a low-powered telescope will make the Jovian satellites visible.
Here’s a link to a site showing a view when, on August 16, 2009, the shadow of Jupiter’s moon Io fell on another moon, Ganymede, with an animated .GIF made from photos the observer (Christopher Go from Cebu, Philippines) took with an 11-inch Celestron telescope (which is not very big, as telescopes go.) It’s amazing how much surface detail on the moons he was able to record.
As **DHMO **notes, the planetary alignment is visible in various permutations in the north-eastern sky in the early morning for most of the rest of May.