skywatch

Autumn has arrived in Middlemarch.

Every now and then an astronomer finds themselves asking a question that sounds faintly ridiculous but is, in fact, perfectly reasonable.

On calm nights in Middlemarch, when the wind drops and the paddocks fall quiet, my usual practice is to step outside before bed and gaze upwards.

On Tuesday evening, as the last light fades over Otago Harbour and the first stars appear, something rather wonderful will begin.

On Tuesday night, just after dinner, step outside and look east.

The nights are starting to feel like autumn again — colder, steadier: the sort of air that makes the stars look as though someone has polished them.

Out here in the Strath Taieri, the nights have started to feel like autumn again — colder, steadier: the sort of air that makes the stars look as though someone has polished them.

Out at Middlemarch, the night has a way of settling in properly.

Space weather, I’ve learned, behaves very much like normal weather.

The moon has been keeping me company again this week, lifting itself into the evening sky with a calm, unhurried assurance.

The western horizon from my Middlemarch place has improved markedly of late.

As this is the final Skywatch column for the year, it feels like the right moment to look back rather than up — though, of course, I’ve done plenty of both.

Out in Middlemarch last week, under what might generously be called a luminous sky — the full moon hanging over the Strath Taieri like an over-keen floodlight — I turned my telescope toward Orion.

Occasionally, astronomy presents you with a piece of technology that changes your life.

I’ve been spending a lot of evenings lately at my new observatory near Middlemarch.

From Dunedin to Fairbanks, Alaska, is a long way — roughly 12,000km, or one very long Air New Zealand flight featuring a toilet seat clearly designed by a sadist