The natural Navigation: The Right Course, Naturally

Once more my pre-dawn ‘Batsense’ kicked in and I awoke before five with an urgent desire to go outside. It was not the pressure on my bladder, I do not think, but the idyllic conditions and night sky players that were beckoning me.

Orion and his sword were first to offer their greetings and then I noticed Jupiter still visible in the southwest. Sirius, Betelgeuse, Capella, the Plough and Polaris sketched out some order in the celestial sphere.

The moon was close to setting and was lighting up rows of fluffy cumulus clouds on their western edges. As time passed the clouds lost their bright white western edges, but gained pink and orange eastern ones. They moved sedately towards the northeast, signalling the start to a fine day. (Photo to the right was taken a few minutes ago.)

Thanks to everyone who came to hear my talks and buy the book at the Outdoors Show yesterday. I will be giving the talks again today and on Sunday at the following times on the stage at the Wilderness Camp:

1.15: The Wonderful World of Natural Navigation. A quick peek at a couple of the journeys that led to my passion for the subject, including the transatlantics, and then a whirlwind tour of lots of techniques that you can use yourself.

4.00:  Navigating Using the Night Sky. The ways we can use the stars, moon and planets to find our way. Introducing the ‘celestial sphere’, which despite its name is a great way to simplify the night sky.

I will be signing copies afterwards so bring yours along if you already have one or hopefully there will be some left to buy later at the show.

Hope you can make…

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Last night, looking west through some tree branches, I took this picture of the orange star, Arcturus. It is one of the five brightest stars in the night sky and is part of the constellation Bootes. It is in fact the brightest star in the northern half of the celestial sphere.

It is navigationally interesting because of its declination or ‘celestial latitude’. At 19 degrees north it passes overhead a lot of major cities, including Honolulu, Mumbai and Mexico City.

The easiest way to find Arcturus is to follow the the handle of the Plough on its curved path away from the ‘saucepan’. The star that can just be seen in the top right of the photo is the end of the saucepan handle.

It’s my birthday today and one of my favourite presents has been this chocolate slab from ‘Hotel Chocolat‘. It shows the mythological Titan, Atlas, holding a sphere on his shoulders. The popular misconception about Atlas is that he holds the Earth on his shoulders. This work of chocolate art is correct in portraying him holding the ‘heavens’ on his shoulders, not just Earth. The ancient Greek belief was that the stars and other celestial objects were part of a celestial sphere that rotated about a central and stationery Earth.

The sphere that Atlas carries can be seen to be the heavens because it has constellations on it, not continents as would be the case if the globe was Earth.