Looking to get into astronomy

Dave,
when I was in your shoes years ago, what I did was just go outside and do nothing - thats right, nothing!

I had a couple of old Sky & Telescope magazines (the only ones I could get in Ireland, and they were already a couple years old too!), and pulling out their chart in the middle page, I just went outside and spent some time looking for the constellations according to patterns.

That, and getting to know north from south (look at Polaris for due north, therefore behind you is south), worked for me, and in no time at all, I was able to start pinning down objects when I heard left of Orion, or under the Beehive and so on.

Its a quick and easy self-teaching guide to finding your way. That would be the best I could advise you to do anyway. And charts are all over the net too, free to (download and) print.

Seanie.

you can get a free download pdf of the star chart for the month (along with interesting objects on view) from www.skymaps.com

just editting this post to mention the new Dorling-Kindersley book "Universe". The book club here at work have just received a new post-Christmas selection and this book is listed for €16. I'd nearly prioritise this one over the Skywatching and Advanced Skywatching books for the moment as it is very up-to-date. A good overall astronomy reference is well worth having.

I got this book from Santa and would recommend it to anyone. It's a great coffee table book for picking up and browsing at leasure and is very up to date, as John said. I seriously doubt that Santa got it for €16! What a bargain.

Hey folks,

just an update -- my girlfriend bought me a telescope for my birthday (which is today ), which I didn't really ask for, but was pleased to get

It was relatively clear night last night, so I took some time to assemble it and myself and my cousin spent a few hours looking through it.

We started off looking at the moon, which was really clear and bright -- excellent to look at! Enjoyed that for a while, looking at the landscapes, etc

Then the clouds parted further and I noticed a 'star' close to the moon, so I spent a bit of time trying to see that through the scope -- took ages, but when I found it and looked at it for a while I noticed that it was shaped like Saturn! :shock: I could see the shape of it! I thought that it was my imagination since I had only seen pictures of Saturn from that kind of distance recently, so I thought I was joining the dots myself But my cousin had a look too and he was able to see the shape also!

Unfortunately we couldn't see a clear picture with the magnified scope, but maybe in the future

When we were done, I opened one of the programs which was recommended to download in this thread (I think), and checked to see if we were both imagining it, but sure enough it showed Saturn close-by to the moon!

So I'm quite happy Handy that the second thing I look at happens to be a recognisable planet, eh?

Thanks for the help everyone, I can feel myself developing as an astronomer as we speak

Nice one Dave, and Happy Birthday! What kind of a scope id she get for you?

Seanie.

Happy Birthday Dave!!!