When you wish upon a
star
Crisp, pitch-dark nights while camping beckon the hidden
stargazer in all of us, no matter how young or old you are. Sitting outside at
a campsite surrounded with limited, if any urban light impacting your gaze,
creates the perfect environment to test your astronomy. And it’s a test as the
International Astronomical Union (IAU), recognizes 88 constellations covering
the entire northern and southern sky.
Start off simple. In
the northern hemisphere, Ursula Major or the Big Dipper is the easiest constellation
to spot. In the southern hemisphere, it
is the Crux or Southern Cross. Once you know
a few basic constellations, do a little research and discover their
backstories. Most constellations are
based on mythological tales. It’s always
more fun to find stars, especially for kids, when they know how Orion fights
against the charging Taurus while pursuing the beautiful Pleiades sisters.
Is it a bird, a
plane, no it’s little green men
Most of us were taught there are nine planets in the solar
system. That was correct until 2006 when
poor Pluto was demoted and the official number was reduced to eight by the IAU. The five brightest planets, Mercury, Venus, Mars,
Jupiter, Saturn, can be distinguished from stars because their position changes
slightly from one night to the next and they do not twinkle like stars.
Meteorites, or as we all lovingly call them, shooting stars,
are small objects that enter the Earth’s atmosphere. As they pass through, they burn up and leave
small bits of burning materials in their wake.
This burning material creates the shooting stars as the Meteorites
disintegrate through the sky.
If you do spot a moving object in the sky, it is more likely a Satellite, than an alien spaceship. Satellites move slowly across the sky. The most notable Satellite to spot is the
International Space Station, which is brighter than Venus in the night sky. Younger
kids will have fun waving at the astronauts occupying the space station once it
is spotted. If you have entered your zip code into http://www.spaceweather.com/flybys/
and it does not recognize the satellite you’ve identified, don’t worry its
probably a UFO (just kidding).
21st
century stargazing
In modern stargazing, technology comes in super handy. Grab you smart phone and become an
astronomical expert with the click or point of it. There are amazing apps for smart phones that
make identification of celestial bodies easy no matter where in the world you
live. Some are free while others have a
nominal charge to download. We like a
few top rated options but there are many more available.
- Starwalk
- Sky Safari 3
- The Night Sky
- Gosky watch
What you’ll need
- Season and hemisphere specific star charts
- Binoculars (or a telescope)
- Stargazing apps for smart phone
- Flashlight beam
So layback on a blanket at the end of the evening. Put out the campfire and let the night sky
envelop you. The stars will come out and
say hello
