• • Clear night sky
• • Minimal light pollution

The North Star, or Polaris, due to its location above the Earth’s axis, is always in the North. If you can find Polaris, you can determine your direction of travel. The hard part, though, is that there are a lot of stars and Polaris isn’t particularly bright or different from the other 250 billion in our galaxy. To find the North Star, first, you need to find the Ursa Major (Big Dipper) constellation.

Once you find the Ursa Major (Big Dipper), locate the two stars at the end of the ladle, known as the pointer stars. Draw an imaginary line from the pointer stars out to about 5x their length: the bright star located there is the North Star.

At different times of the year, the Big Dipper will have different orientations (upside down, etc) so finding it is always a fun activity. Practice locating the Big Dipper and the North Star together throughout the year.