Stargazing

November Star Stories at Abriachan Forest

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Waxing crescent Moon at Abriachan Forest

Join us up at Abriachan Forest on November 4th for our first event of the 2022 Stargazing season – ‘Moon, Planets and Fox & Fire!’

To kick off the winter series our first event will be a Moon and Planet special with the waxing gibbous Moon, Jupiter and Saturn on display for live binoculor and telescope observing guided by astronomer Stephen Mackintosh. If skies are poor Stephen will instead present an indoor talk in the forest classroom on the history of lunar and planetary observing, going back to the earliest ideas our ancestors had about the Moon and Wandering Stars.

In addition the Abriachan team will present ‘Fox and Fire’ storytelling around the campfire with refreshments provided.

Due to site and classroom capacity, booking via Eventbrite is essential. Admission is free for under 16s with accompanying adults but please inform Abriachan of any large booking requests.

Tickets can be purchased on Eventbrite HERE.

Guide to September Skies

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What’s Up in September 2022 Night Sky Guide.

I hope you enjoy my short guide to September skies. Everything in this guide is calibrated to views around 11pm. Highlights include:

– Jupiter, Saturn and Mars

– The Pleiades and Hyades open star clusters

– The Winter Triangle

– The Milky Way

– Lyra with the double double and ring nebula

– The Plough and its famous double star

Clear skies.

Stargazing at Abriachan Forest – November 4th 2022 launch

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Stargazing at Abriachan Forest will be back this year beginning Friday November 4th. Our first event will be a Moon and planet special with this season resplendent with bright planets in the run up to Christmas.

I’d also like to wish Scotland’s astronomer royal Catherine Heymans a speedy recovery. Some of you may remember Catherine had to cancel her event at Abriachan last February after contracting Covid a day or so before her appearance.  

Unfortunately Catherine is now suffering with long covid and last I heard was unable to continue her outreach duties. Catherine is still keen to join us as a guest speaker as soon as she can. Get well soon.

Tickets for our first event will go up in early October.

Stargazing at the End of Night

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Sunset over Glen Docherty

This was me on the road and heading into the western Highlands last Saturday for my final stargazing gig of the season with the Woodland Trust.  

Skies this far north will shortly be too bright to stargaze with only Astronomical Twilight levels of darkness left near midnight and no official ‘night’ again until mid to late August. So do get out while you still can.  Of course the further south you are the less impacted you will be by this ‘near’ midnight Sun.

I had an eventful stargazing session with the Woodland Trust who were based at the Torridon for several nights. We first headed outside at about 10.30pm to view the crescent Moon with binoculars during early twilight skies – still too bright to see many stars apart from brilliant Arcturus.

The spring star Arcturus ‘Bear Watcher’ was bright enough to see in early twilight during our Moon gazing session.

After heading back inside for more projector based astronomy we ventured outside once more after 11pm and were fortunate to see a decent collection of bright stars and constellations despite some hazy cloud overhead.

Vega, Capella, Arcturus and Spica were all visible, in addition to the main stars in the Plough. I’d like to thank the Woodland Trust for inviting me and wish them well in their rewilding endeavours across the Highlands.

Tales of the Moon with Catherine Heymans

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Stargazing and Moon Observing with Scotland’s Astronomer Royal Catherine Heymans.

Join me up at Abriachan Forest (a Dark Sky Discovery site) for an evening of stargazing, Moon observing and astronomy with our special guest Scotland’s astronomer royal Catherine Heymans.

If skies are clear Catherine and local astronomer Stephen Mackintosh will host an outdoor Moon observing session with binoculars and telescope. Following this Catherine will present her indoor guest talk titled “Do Look up! Space Rocks and Killer Asteroids”

Refreshments provided plus binoculars for stargazing. Under 16s with accompanying adults go free. 

Catherine Heymans is the Astronomer Royal for Scotland and Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Edinburgh. She’s also director of the German Centre for Cosmological Lensing at the Ruhr-University Bochum. She is an experienced science communicator, visiting schools across Scotland, in addition to art, music, comedy, philosophy and science festivals.

Tickets are available via Eventbrite or my Facebook page.

Tales of Dark Matter

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All the light we see from distant stars and galaxies is made from visible matter, yet evidence from the rotational speeds of other galaxies suggests dark matter outweighs visible matter on a ratio six to one. Image: ‘Our galaxy Over Achnasheen’, Stephen Mackintosh

Join me up at Abriachan Forest (a Dark Sky Discovery site) for an evening of stargazing and astronomy on February 25th with our first guest speaker of the 2022 season – Professor Martin Hendry.

If skies are clear Martin and myself will host an outdoor stargazing session, discussion and Q&A under the stars. Following this Martin will present his indoor guest talk on the very latest discoveries in cosmology, concentrating on the elusive nature of dark matter and dark energy.

Refreshments provided plus binoculars for stargazing. Under 16s with accompanying adults go free. Tickets can be booked via Eventbrite here or you can reserve directly from my Facebook page here.

Martin speaking at the Science on Stage Festival

Martin Hendry is Professor of Gravitational Astrophysics and Cosmology at the University of Glasgow and is a passionate advocate for STEM education and science engagement with schools and public audiences. He is the author of more than 200 scientific articles and is a senior member of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration, the global team of more than 1400 scientists which made the first-ever detection of gravitational waves – a discovery awarded the 2017 Nobel Prize for Physics. Martin is a Fellow of the Institute of Physics and the Royal Society of Edinburgh and is currently a Trustee of the IOP and the James Clerk Maxwell Foundation. In 2015 he was awarded an MBE for services to the public understanding of science.