Navigating the Stars
Finding your way by the stars is an incredible – and ancient – skill which you can learn to do in minutes, says Natural Navigator Tristan Gooley
Many people like the idea of navigating by the stars but don’t know where to start or presume it’s too difficult a skill to master. Tristan Gooley believes it needn’t be complicated at all.
Tristan, who runs his own Natural Navigation school, believes using the night sky to navigate is much quicker and easier than using a compass – and a lot more fun.
‘I put together a lot of expeditions when I was younger and they usually ended up being big and ambitious,’ he says. ‘Then I discovered that a small journey, using nature to navigate, is just as challenging as a long one using electronics – and is, strangely, more fun.
‘It’s also a lot cheaper, which helps when you’re young. It sounds crazy, but you can have as much fun crossing a wood for an hour using natural navigation as you can on an expedition that lasts a few days.’
Don’t be Reliant on Technology
Learning to navigate by the stars is a useful backup skill, especially if you’re relying on technology at night: ‘If your compass or GPS breaks, lets you down or disappears for some reason, you have a good alternative.
‘Even if you are using a compass or GPS, the stars are really useful as a gross-error check; they can let you know something’s not right before the kit does. For example, if you’re meant to be walking west and you spot the North Star on your left, it’s probably time to pause and work out what’s going on. ‘It’s also a really good skill for checking your kit is working before setting off. If the North Star and your compass disagree badly, it’s definitely time to worry about the compass.’
‘The mistake some people make is to try to walk towards the stars themselves – they end up wandering around with their heads tipped up, bumping into things and tripping over.’
Being able to navigate by the stars is a fast and reliable way to get a sense of direction when you are walking outdoors at night.
‘The stars never break or run out of batteries,’ he adds. ‘In every expedition group there is usually someone who knows how to find their way by using the stars – and it’s fun if that someone is you.’
Finding the North Star
The key skill, according to Tristan, is being able to find Polaris, the North Star.
‘You can learn to find the North Star in under a minute,’ he says, ‘and then it only takes a few seconds to use simple navigation techniques.’
The easiest way to find Polaris, or the North Star, is by finding the Plough, an easy-to-identify group of seven stars. This group is known as the Big Dipper to Americans and is sometimes nicknamed “the saucepan”.
Next you need to find the pointer stars – these are the two stars that a liquid would run off if you tipped up your “saucepan”. The North Star will always be five times the distance between these two pointers in the direction they point (away from the pan). True north lies directly under this star.
Check for Cassiopeia
The constellation Cassiopeia is also very helpful in finding the North Star. It will always be on the opposite side of the North Star from the Plough, and therefore often high in the sky when the Plough is low or obscured.
It’s important to remember that the Plough rotates anti-clockwise about the North Star, so it will sometimes appear on its side or even upside down. However, its relationship with the North Star never changes and it will always dependably point the way to it.
‘The reason the North Star is so important for natural navigation is that it sits directly over the North Pole,’ says Tristan. ‘People often forget that whenever you are trying to find true north, you are actually trying to find the direction of the North Pole from wherever you are – even if you are only heading a few hundred metres on a gentle walk. ‘North’ is still just an abbreviation for ‘towards the North Pole’.‘
Estimate your Latitude
Wherever you are in the Northern Hemisphere, the North Star will be the same angle above the horizon as your latitude. This can be measured accurately using a sextant, but an estimate can be made using an outstretched fist.
An outstretched fist makes an angle of close to 10 degrees for most people. In under a minute, and with just your bare hands, you can find north and therefore estimate your latitude.
Find East and West with Orion
The constellation Orion rises in the east and sets in the west. Orion’s Belt, consisting of the only three bright stars in the whole of the night sky that form a short straight line, rises very close to due east and sets very close to due west. The first star in the belt to rise and set, called Mintaka, will always do so within one degree of true east and west, wherever you are in the world.
Tristan has written lots of books and runs online courses on how to use the sun, moon, plants and animals to help you find your way on land, at sea and even in the city.
If you are interested in astronomy, you might also like to read our article on how to spot constellations.