Perseid Meteor Shower August 12th, 2016, Thayne, Star Valley, Wyoming

There are meteor showers and there are meteor showers. Often the term shower is used loosely and its really a meteor drizzle. Several times a year there are true showers, like the Perseid's, and every thirty three years a meteor storm occurs. That one is named the Leonids and happens in November.
The highest meteor count I ever made was in the Lenoid Shower in 1999. I held a star party and my students and I counted 347 falling stars per hour.
This morning was the peak of the Perseid's and I had no problem waking up in the middle of the  night and going outside to see the shower, (One of the advantages of getting older is the need to get up in the middle of the night).
 Settling in to our new lawn chairs, and wrapped up in a blanket, I first looked at the Little Dipper. All the stars were visible and so I knew I had excellent viewing conditions. I knew that would be the case as we live at six thousand feet, with no light pollution.
The Milky Way was overhead in all its glory and Perseus was just below my zenith. Noting the time I began to count the falling stars and from 2:36-2:57 am MDS time I counted 26 falling stars. That turns into an hourly rate of seventy four falling stars per hour.
Going back inside I woke up Renita, (she had actually asked me to), and returning outside we counted 32 falling stars from 3:03--:21 am. That calculates into 106 falling stars per hour and that is one of the best meteor counts I have ever had for the Perseids!
The next seventeen minutes, 3:21-3:38 gave us 30 more meteors with a count about the same, 105 per hour. By this time Renita and I got cold, its cold here in the mountains, and she went back to bed. I stayed outside for another count and saw twenty more in the next fourteen minutes, from 3:38-3:52 a count of 86 per hour.
By this time I was pretty cold so I also went inside to calculate the hourly rates and make some cinnamon rolls. They are never as good as the ones made by my sister Connie, but that's no surprise as she makes the best cinnamon rolls in the world!
All in all it was one of the best meteor shows we have ever seen and definitely the best Perseids! Clear skies