Hello there!

Welcome to (yet another) astronomy blog, yup! It’s another blog that waffles on about how great astronomy is. Except, this one is different. Or, at least, I hope it is. There will be regular updates on what can be seen in the night sky and highlights for the month. There is also a gallery of amateur images, some of which have been captured by me, and there’s a section for those starting out in the hobby. From buying your first telescope to taking part in your first Messier marathon.

Astronomy is a great hobby, whether you’re out on your own or with a group of like minded mates, there’s always that “first”. The first view of a particular object or observing a feature such as the Great Red Spot on Jupiter for the first time. Personally, I get great enjoyment from sharing my love of the science. Whether I’m chatting with friends or showing an inquisitive passer-by, there’s something to be said for that moment when you show someone Saturn for the first time, it’s one of the “Wow!” moments.

So, what got me started? I was a very young boy when I was given a small spotting telescope by a family friend, if I’m honest I wasn’t really sure what to do with it, the thing sat in my bedroom for a while until one night I looked out of my bedroom window, the full moon was sitting in the sky, suddenly it clicked. I took the scope out of it’s case, stood it on the window sill and pointed it roughly in the direction of the moon. The sight was glorious, even in that little 1.5-inch aperture 120mm focal length the moon was astounding, and I was hooked.

Sadly, life got in the way and although I regularly studied the night sky, learning the constellations and about the planets I didn’t do much about learning more until my mid-twenties when I bought a second-hand pair of 10x50 Helios binoculars. I knew there was more to the sky than just the stars, constellations and Solar System planets. Those binoculars gave me an insight of what was out there when I used them for the first time to view M31. I Spent a good hour viewing the Andromeda Galaxy with them for the first time.

Fast forward another 5 years when I bought my first astronomical telescope. A 3-inch aperture 900mm focal length alt-az Tasco Luminova Newtonian. My first object with that was Saturn. That little scope pulled the planet closer to me and I could clearly see the ring system and colour bands in the planets upper atmosphere. I still have that telescope, compared to my other ‘scopes it’s really not very good, but it has a special meaning for me, it was, after all, my entry into the hobby.

I have 3 main telescopes now, two Skywatchers and a Meade. My first Skywatcher is a 5-inch 1500mm Maksutov Cassegrain, the second is a 6-inch 750mm PDS Newtonian. The Meade is a, very, portable 80mm aperture 400mm focal length refractor. There’s a lot to be said for manufacturer choice, similar to the debate over apple or Android smart devices, obviously Android is the better, and for me, I like Skywatcher astro kit. Celestron and Skywatcher are both very nice, but Skywatcher seem to appeal to me, I don’t really know why. Celestron have some excellent add-on kit, WI-Fi mods, GPS pods, and they now produce a wide range of mounts that can be controlled via a Smartphone or tablet.

This brings me to the next issue about ‘scope choice, Go-To or manually pointed. There are those who feel that Go-To mounts are the lazy mans way of doing things, ideally a Go-To mount gets switched on, aligned and then you simply select an object from a list, after a short whirring and grinding the telescope is pointing at the object and all you need to do is look through the eyepiece. A manually targeted ‘scope require knowledge of the location of that elusive object and hunting it down. The more you use a manual ‘scope the better you get at finding things. The choice of mount is also very important. I was once told that the best thing to do is buy the heaviest mount that you can afford/carry, you’ll change your ‘scope more than you change your mount. My first Skywatcher mount was an EQ3 that I upgraded with a motorised drive kit. My main mount now is a very hefty HEQ5 pro SynScan, (SynScan simply means it’s Go-To)

There will be more on mounts, ‘scopes and binoculars at later dates.

The next step for me was to find a club or some sort of group that would help me learn more. This a came along when a sterling chap introduced me to what would eventually become Ashford Astronomical Society. We scared the living daylights out of the then chairman on my first visit.

Membership of the society grew and I became much more actively involved in the group, presenting talks and co hosting events. Eventually my confidence grew, not only in my presenting style but also in my knowledge of the night sky and I took on the job of presenting the monthly sky tour at the meetings, it’s affectionately referred to as “Upstares” but I’ve never really liked that title and I rarely use it in the presentations.

Two years ago, the existing Chairman and General Secretary made the choice to step down as they both wished to move on to other projects, the out going Chairman is, in fact, a rather good author and has written some sterling books. A new committee was needed and I decided to stand for the position of Assistant Chairman, a post that I am very proud of having and I am honoured that I am starting my third year in the role. I am always on the look out for new methods to introduce astronomy to the masses.

So that’s the first post for the blog, a bit meandering and long winded, but I felt the need to “introduce” myself. I don’t claim to be all knowledgeable, but I hope that readers will find the blog useful. Some of it will change regularly whilst other sections will remain the same for a while. The Gallery will be added to semi regularly, Object of the Month and the monthly sky tour will be updated um… monthly, Other bits will be changed when I find something interesting to add.

Over the next few weeks I’ll talk in detail about the different types of mounts, telescope and binoculars and what can be expected from them.

Thanks for reading, if this blog inspires you to look up then great, it’s achieved exactly what I want it to do.

Please visit again