Let’s Star Hop Around The Night Sky

Fasten your seatbelts, because we are in full gear for recognizing the stars! The first star that we will look for is Polaris, and there are two ways to locate it.

(For a background information on astronomy and the night sky, checkout Scientific and Mystic Wonders of the Night Sky)

Locating Polaris

The first way is to look for this pattern, that appears like a pair of baseless triangles, hovering side-by-side, forming the letter M:

Fortunately for us, this pattern is unique in the whole of night sky. If you start looking for triangles, you will find them everywhere! So that’s not very useful. But this pattern is unique. This is the constellation of Cassiopeia. The Greek way to remember it is to view a queen, sitting on a royal chair. Now take the inner line segment of the smaller triangle — that is the line that connects Gamma Cassiopeia and Ruchbah, take its midpoint and start moving perpendicular to it, down the constellation (see picture below).