There are thousands of stars up there

12 December 2012 – It’s my first foray into the field outside my house. It’s freezing cold, of course. But it’s amazingly clear. They’re all there. I can see the Milky Way running across the sky and there’s almost no moon.

There’s just one problem. There are thousands of stars up there. Where to start?

A cry of triumph goes up across deepest Suffolk. There, in the North, is the ‘distinctive’ shape of the Plough. Or Ursa Major as I should now call it.

According to the books, all the constellations have ‘distinctive’ shapes but the Plough really does look like a plough. One constellation down. 87 to go.