Recommend a galaxy to look at?

I'm pretty new to this star gazing hobby, but so far I've been having a blast. To date, I've only seen: the moon, mars, saturn, jupiter, the orion nebula (if that's the one in his scabard), and the pleiades. Plus a few random stars, but I don't know what they were.

So, here's my question. I'd like to find some galaxies. Can anyone recommend some good starter galaxies to look at? North and west horizons are tough for me to see due to hills and trees, but I have great views above, south and east. Oh yes, I'm in the northeast, too.

Thanks!
-Van

Hi Van,

I'm going to reply on the Beginners Forum since I think there are a few other folks just starting out that would like to see this thread as well.

David Simons

Thanks for the input. I'm using a Meade 8" SCT (focal length of 2000mm). I've found that I'm mostly using 3 eyepieces: 40mm, 25mm and 13.8mm. I do have a 6.something and a 4.7, but, due to either my collimation, or my seeing conditions, they are not really useable or rewarding. It's an older scope that has a motor drive on the RA (?) axis, but that's it. No "goto" so I'll have to figure out how to actually identify and locate what I'm looking at. That's why the planets have been so good!

I also have Starry Night Backyard, which has helped me identify quite a lot, but I haven't really used it to locate anything.

(I'll also put this in the beginner section)