Venus is at inferior conjunction today. That means it positioned between the Earth and Sun.
When the alignment is exact Venus is seen to transit in front of the Sun. At most inferior conjunctions the alignment is not exact and Venus passes above or below the Sun. That was how things were today; Venus passed just under 8 degrees south of the Sun.
Here is the simulated view provided by Stellarium:
It's very difficult to observe Venus under these circumstances. The planet isn't visible to the naked eye. It's so close to the Sun that even when the telescope is aimed at Venus some sunlight can still enter the optical system and cook the inside of the telescope!
I was using a Celestron NexStar 102SLT to observe Venus. The telescope is tracking Venus on the HEQ5 Pro mount. Without being able to do a polar alignment in daylight it was fairly tricky to find Venus. My method was to get the 'scope pointed at the Sun (and then correctly focussed) with a solar filter in place. Then I offset the telescope by the required number of degrees in RA and Dec and hoped for the best after removing the solar filter.
Venus was relatively easy to see once it entered the field of view. A razor sharp white crescent against bright blue sky. The air was a little turbulent and that stopped me getting a good picture with the camera. I did get the crescent though:
Venus has been visible in the evening sky after sunset since late 2014. After today it is technically a morning sky object - visible before dawn. Venus will be shining in the morning sky before sunrise before the end of the month.
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