Observing log · Stockholm
What is actually visible tonight, and how high it gets.
Observing notes from the Stockholm archipelago: what binoculars and a small telescope really show at fifty-nine degrees north, and when to bother.
Logged from a jetty in the Stockholm archipelago, Sweden, since 2020.
Hours of true darkness, month by month
Astronomical darkness begins when the sun is eighteen degrees below the horizon. At this latitude it does not happen at all between late April and late August, which is the single fact that shapes every entry in this log.
From the log
Each entry begins as a pencil note on the step and is typed up within the week, with the conditions written down before the impression.
- Waxing gibbous
Entry 05 · Equipment · Jun 2026
A small telescope on a cold island: dew, frost and low targets
Cooling times, dew shields, frost on a mirror, and the large part of the southern sky that a six-inch reflector at this latitude can never reach.
- Observed
- 7 Jun 2026
- Instrument
- Naked eye
- Seeing
- 5 of 5
- Written up
- 24 Aug 2026
- Full moon
Entry 04 · Planning · Nov 2025
Planning a clear night around the moon, the forecast and the boat
How I plan a month of observing around the lunar cycle, an unreliable coastal forecast, a winter boat timetable and the cold on an open jetty.
- Observed
- 30 Nov 2025
- Instrument
- 10x50 binoculars
- Seeing
- 2 of 5
- Written up
- 8 Feb 2026
- Waning crescent
Entry 03 · Aurora · Mar 2025
Aurora at fifty-nine north: what is honest to expect down here
Aurora seen from fifty-nine degrees north is rarer and lower than the photographs suggest. What the indices mean here, and two nights that delivered.
- Observed
- 9 Mar 2025
- Instrument
- 15x70 on a tripod
- Seeing
- 5 of 5
- Written up
- 1 Jun 2025
- Waxing crescent
Entry 02 · Binoculars · Oct 2024
A pair of 10x50s from the jetty: what binoculars really reach
Four autumns of notes on what a hand-held pair of binoculars actually reaches under a bright northern sky, and what they will never show.
- Observed
- 13 Oct 2024
- Instrument
- 150 mm reflector
- Seeing
- 4 of 5
- Written up
- 26 Jan 2025
- Full moon
Entry 01 · Summer · May 2024
Four months without a proper night: summer at fifty-nine north
Why there is no astronomical darkness here between late April and late August, what is still worth observing, and how to use the season.
- Observed
- 26 May 2024
- Instrument
- 15x70 on a tripod
- Seeing
- 5 of 5
- Written up
- 18 Aug 2024
Standing orders
Four rules the notebook keeps
I keep a dated log of what is actually visible from a jetty in the Stockholm archipelago, using modest binoculars and a six-inch reflector. I try to be honest about the many nights when the answer is almost nothing.
- Write the date, the time and the altitude before the impression.
- Describe the sky you had, not the one you wanted.
- Latitude beats aperture; plan around it.
- A clouded-out night still goes in the notebook.