The Northwoods Explorers
of Space and Astronomy
A group of Space and Astronomy Adventurers
“The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity”. (Dorothy Parker)
We live in an amazing Universe, come explore with us.
We are on a journey of discovery.
Upcoming Events
All events are free to the General Public
(Unless stated otherwise)
Educational Fun for all Ages including all the young scientists!
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Mar 17 The red planet Mars, with the red giant stars Betelgeuse and Aldebaran, will form what appears as a triangle from our view here on Earth. They will look similar in color, as Aldebaran and Betelgeuse are red giants and Mars is referred to as the red planet (these can also look orange-ish). Aldebaran is only 65 light years distant. NASA's planetary exploration spacecraft Pioneer 10 is headed in the direction of Aldebaran and will make its closest approach in about 2 million years. Betelgeuse is about 10 times further than Aldebaran. It's at the end of its life and may become a supernova sometime soon. Mars is just 9 light minutes from us, so even though they look close to each other these objects are far apart.
Another familiar open cluster is the Pleiades. It is easy to spot by finding Betelgeuse in Orion, then look towards Aldebaran, another red giant just above and to the right, then continue until you spot a few stars close together. If the skies permit, with good vision you could see 7-8 stars, in binoculars, hundreds. This group is also referred to as the "Seven Sisters". This group is about 444 light years distant. (looking south)
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Upcoming Events
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Beginner's Guide to Stargazing
3 Class series - Fe University - Hurley, WI
March 21, 28, April 4, 2-3:30 PM
Field stargazing trip April 11 7:30-9:30 PM
We will cover the tools used to help find your way among the stars, when it is best to look for planets, galaxies, meteor showers, and aurora. The first class covers the Solar System, class 2 is on the Milky Way Galaxy, and the 3rd on the Universe. We will follow up with a stargazing field trip. The cost for Early-Bird Registrants is $25. Registrants will receive a 12-month constellation guide and other materials. Classes are held on March 21, March 28, and April 4, with the field trip April 11, weather permitting. Click below for the registration page and detailed information:
Beginner’s Guide to Stargazing – Fe University
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June 15, 10AM Sun, Moon, Stars
Youth program
Minocqua Library
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June 21 Summer Solstice Solar Starparty
Location TBD
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Beginner's Guide to Stargazing
3 Class series - Discovery Center - Manitowish Waters
July 25, Aug 1, Aug 8
5:00-6:30 PM
Starparty Sep 22, backup 23 ( see below)
We will cover the tools used to help find your way among the stars, when it is best to look for planets, galaxies, meteor showers, and aurora. The first class covers the Solar System, class 2 is on the Milky Way Galaxy, and the 3rd on the Universe. We will follow up with a stargazing field trip. Recipients will receive a
12-month constellation guide and other materials.
Click below for the registration page and detailed information:
Discovery Center – A Natural Destination for Discovery
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Aug 12-13 Perseid Meteor Shower
Location: Everywhere
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August 18 YMCA Day Camp (YMCA only)
Astronomy and Space Activities
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Discovery Center Astronomy Night
Sep 22 ( backup Sep 23)
Pre-Stargazing Talk 6:30 PM
Stargazing 7:15-9:30 PM
Join members from Northwoods Explorers for this fun and informative night program! We'll use lasers that point for miles to show the constellations and where we might see a few fascinating objects using binoculars and telescopes to observe Saturn, the crescent moon, the Ring Nebula M57 in Lyra, the Globular Cluster M13 in Hercules, Alberio and a few other double stars, and perhaps Jupiter later in the evening.Come learn more about how these objects fit into the big picture.
Program begins at 6:30 PM with an introductory program inside the Lodge, then stargazing 7:15- 9:30 PM. If the weather doesn't cooperate, we will extend the program inside the Lodge. Back-up date will be Saturday, September 23, 2023. White light flashlights are NOT allowed. Please use red lights or cover your white light with many layers of red cellophane or a thick red balloon. A white light shined into dark-adapted eyes is painful and ruins a person's view for up to 20 minutes so you might miss something important!
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Northwoods Explorers' Membership Program
The Northwoods Explorers membership program offers the opportunity to learn more about our Universe and how to find your way among the nearby stars along with supporting our public outreach programs.
Visit our Membership Page Here
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Squirrel Hill Aurora Watch
Signup to to watch the Northern Lights on the Minocqua Winter Park's Squirrel Hill Lookout that has an incredible wide view to the northern skies.
Our Sun looks like it's on the way to Maximum. This might increase the probabilities of seeing Aurora over the next few years.
Our nearest star could produce an incredible amount of activity.
Check our calendar to take advantage of the opportunities to safely observe Prominences on the limb of our Sun through Hydrogen-alpha (Ha) Telescopes during our daytime events.
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Past Events:
Northwoods Explorers January Meeting
Saturday, January 21, 1-2:30 PM
Minocqua Public Library
"Explorer 1"
Open to the general public. We will have the latest news then we will watch the NASA/JPL Movie "Explorer 1" (53 min). 65 years ago the Space Race started. We'll discover how we blew up many rockets trying to catch up to the Russians, who had just launched Sputnik 1. From this confusion NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory were created, and the space race was on! Discussion will follow.
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Northwoods Explorers Fall Public Meeting
Saturday November 19, 6:30 - 8:00 PM
Dr. Sebastian Zamfir, Quasars!
Free event, all are welcome! First, we'll hand out a few awards,
announce our future programs, and a quick update on what's up in the Night Sky,
then Dr. Sebastian Zamfir from the Astronomy and Physics Dept of UWSP
will speak about quasars, active galactic nuclei, and how these discoveries
fit in with how our Milky Way Galaxy developed.
Refreshments Included
Exploring Quasars through Optical Spectroscopy
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North Lakeland School
Manitowish Waters
Friday, November 11th, 6:30pm-8:00pm
Do you find yourself gazing towards the stars on our beautiful Northwoods nights? This class will cover what's up in the sky each season of the year,
what to look for in binoculars, when to look for meteor showers,
and find out where we are in our Milky Way Galaxy.
If the weather permits, we'll observe Jupiter-and four of its moons, Saturn and its rings, a few double stars, and other deep sky objects through high
powered telescopes for community members to see out of this world sights!
This is a 3 part series covering the observation of the Solar System,
objects in our Milky Way Galaxy, and beyond.
This unique class is sure to fill
up quick with specific viewing nights to follow after this class.
Register Now at
North Lakeland School District - Community Education / Lighted Schoolhouse
*Registrants can bring their own binoculars to this class for enhanced viewing*
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Mercer Public School Stargazing Oct 26
The students were rewarded with one of the best viewing nights
we've had up here, We could easily see Saturn's shadow
on the rings as well as many storm bands on Jupiter!
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers
at the Minocqua Winter Park, Friday, October 28th
6:30 - 9 PM
We had great weather, Bob gave a talk on Jupiter, then we viewed Saturn, Jupiter, M13, M57, M31, the Plieades and a few clusters. Folks were amazed with the image-stabilized binoculars
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers
at the North Lakeland Discovery Center
October 22, 6:30 - 9:00 PM
It was a great evening, Bob began with a talk on the Moon, then we went outside and viewed Jupiter, Saturn, the globular cluster M13, the Ring Nebula M57, the Andromeda Galaxy M31, and the Milky Way with image-stabilized binoculars. Everyone had a great time!
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The Space Race with the Northwoods Explorers
Minocqua Public Library
Thursday, October 6
Everyone seemed to enjoy Bob's presentation and discussion around the current space race. Why the rush, isn't it dangerous, and what is the benefit? We'll reveal the amazing opportunities building bridges to the future, and the challenge of finding scientists and engineers.
It was too cloudy to view Saturn, Jupiter and the moon
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers
at the YMCA of the Northwoods
Saturday, October 1st
The clouds came in, so we showed a presentation on the Solar System inside the YMCA, the audience participated with many questions.
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers
at the North Lakeland Discovery Center
Saturday, September 3rd, 7:15 - 10:00 PM
Another amazing night at the Discovery Center, after watching a presentation on our Solar System many saw the crescent moon up close with many craters, then Saturn with its rings and 4 of its many moons, later we saw Jupiter with 4 moons and a few storm bands, we were going to view more but the clouds came in.
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Artemis Presentation, Stargazing
with the Northwoods Explorers
at the Minocqua Winter Park,
Friday, August 5th
8:30-10:30 PM
Our speaker, Bob Kreuger, presented a great perspective into NASA's Artemis mission to the moon. Our visitors had a chance to look through 3D glasses at Mar's rover's images while on Mars, and checked out a 4.5-billion-year-old meteorite.
We then went outside and observed the moon with many of its craters using high-performance telescopes, then M13 - the great globular cluster in Hercules, next was M57, the Ring Nebula, and viewed the beautiful double star Albireo in Cygnus. Later in the evening we saw Saturn and its rings, but it was low on the horizon, so it wasn't the best view. In a few weeks it will be higher - check out our events in the Fall to get a better view of Saturn and Jupiter.
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Solar Exploration at the YMCA
of the Northwoods
Friday, July 22, 9-11 AM
The seeing was very good, we saw many prominences, flares, sunspots, filaments, over the course of one hour, one prominence grew and flew away from the sun!
We setup 4 stations to rotate 70 K-5 campers, with learning how moon phases work, the central pressure point and center of gravity with rocket balloons, sunburn detector UV bead bracelets, modeling the Solar System's scale, 3D images of Mars from our rovers (thanks JPL), investigated a 4.5 billion year old meteorite, and with an 80mm Lunt Solar Scope, many had their first experiences looking through a telescope and seeing the Sun up close in Ha light, we all had a great time!
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Stargazing with the Wisconsin Society of Science Teachers
at Lowenwood
July 18
At the beautiful Lowenwood retreat with amazing science teachers, we discussed some of the successes using hands-on models to teach astronomy. They continued to explore how to weave astronomy into their programs.
Thunderstorms prevented the opportunity to observe.
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Solar Observing with the Northwoods Explorers
at the Minocqua Winter Park Sunday 1-3 PM June 26
We had a great time observing the Sun in between the clouds, we saw a few prominences, flares, filaments, and sunspots. We showed a short presentation on how stars are created and how they blow up sometimes.
Warning: Do not look directly at the Sun without proper equipment, it can be very harmful to your eyes.
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers
at the Minocqua Winter Park, Friday, June 3rd
We had great skies but the mosquitos bugged us for the first hour, then they disappeared! We saw a beautiful Crescent Moon, then as it became darker, M13 - the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, then M57 the Ring Nebula, which is a star that has expelled most of its mass, we also saw a couple of faint fuzzies near M81 which were spiral galaxies that are about 12 million light years distant. Dew appeared at 10:30 so we packed up. Even at that hour, it was still somewhat light, sky glow was bright, this time of year there's only about 3 hours of astronomical darkness!
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Total Lunar Eclipse
Sunday, May 15th, 2022
Minocqua Winter Park, 9-11 PM
The weather cooperated at first, we set up, then went inside the Chalet for our moon hands-on activity, learning about eclipses, moon phases, supermoons, the moon's day, and more. We went back outside to catch the moon's entry into the Umbra, sprinkles started then turned into rain! Yikes! We packed up what we could, then watched the rest with binoculars. What we saw was Beautiful!! We hope to see the next total Lunar eclipse on Nov 8th, 2022, in the very early morning.
In-between the clouds we saw the International Space Station zoom overhead.
For more information see Total Lunar Eclipse on May 15–16, 2022 – Where and When to See (timeanddate.com) and EarthSky | Total lunar eclipse on May 15-16, 2022
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers
at the Minocqua Winter Park, Saturday, May 7th, 2022
Another fantastic evening at the Minocqua Winter Park, the wind died down, clouds were thin, we observed the crescent moon at 250x and M13, the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, some 25,000 light years distant, at 250x however, we only counted about a thousand stars, not the 500 thousand that are supposedly there!
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Aurora Watch on Squirrel Hill October 30th, 2021
The CME went south of our planet!!
We had a great time at the Squirrel Hill Lookout but the G3 rated storm didn't occur. However, we had an amazing view of our Galaxy! We observed Jupiter and 3 of its moons, Saturn and its rings, and the amazing moon Titan, then M13 the great Hercules Globular Cluster of around 500,000 stars, and the Ring nebula. The skies were clear enough to see M31, the Andromeda Galaxy 2.5 million light years away, with our naked eyes! Then we looked at it through imaged stabilized binoculars, it was as wide as a few full moons.
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Wisconsin Science Festival
A statewide celebration for school-aged children and their families.
Solar System Science Oct 21 - 5 PM, 2021
We had a great turnout at the Minocqua Public Library, they watched a presentation on “Solar System Science - Order out of Chaos” as a part of the Wisconsin Science Festival. They watched the Jet Propulsion Laboratory control center land Curiosity on Mars, then the JUNO mission's close-up views of Jupiter, and Cassini's mission revealing a wonderful view of Saturn.
Afterward, many children enjoyed trying to lift an 18 pound 4.5 billion-year-old meteorite! The skies cleared enough for most everyone to observe Jupiter with 3 of its moons and Saturn. The seeing was very good considering the nearby streetlamps. Dew started around 7 PM with temps at 37 F.
We plan to schedule more events at the Minocqua Library soon, stay in touch by signing up for event notifications.
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers of Space and Astronomy
Saturday, October 9th, 6:30-9:00 PM, 2021
Everyone seemed to enjoy the talk on our Solar System. The skies fully cooperated and we had a great view of Saturn and Jupiter in this beautiful park. The seeing was very good, we were able to use a 7mm eyepiece on a 1500mm FL telescope, we could have done even better but the scope wasn't tracking, to keep up with the rotation of our planet. We could see detail on Saturn and its shadow on the rings, Many bands on Jupiter could be seen, along with 4 of Jupiter's many moons. Just as soon as M13 was available on the 20" Dobsonian telescope the clouds came in along with an increase in dew, so we had to pack up.
We enjoyed the beautiful sky and the park was very accommodating. Stay tuned for future event announcements.
Here's a news story covering this event from
WJFW Channel 12 Rhinelander
Northwoods Explorers host stargazing party // WJFW Newswatch 12
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Friday September 10th 7:30 - 9:30 PM, 2021
North Lakeland Discovery Center
The skies cleared and we had a wonderful evening under the stars at the North Lakeland Discovery Center in Manitowish Waters. We observed many objects -- Saturn and its rings along with Jupiter and its largest moons, the Andromeda galaxy some 2.3 million light years away. the great globular cluster in Hercules where 500,000 stars exist some 23,000 light years distant, and the Ring Nebula, which is the remains of a star's atmosphere expanding out into space.
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Stargazing with the Northwoods Explorers of Space and Astronomy
August 14th 2021
North Lakeland Discovery Center
We were fortunate to have a wonderful evening, no clouds, just a bit of smoke. We saw a few Perseids, a beautiful Crescent Moon, Jupiter and Saturn looked great but were low on the horizon so there wasn't as much detail. At our next event we may have a chance to view them higher in the sky. M13 looked fantastic through the 20" reflector, as well as a blue-hued M57 Ring Nebula. At the end a few were able to view M31, the Andromeda Galaxy, through image-stabilized binoculars.
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July 20th, 2021 "The Space Race"
Minocqua Country Club
(Private Event)
We presented to a wonderful group about the
amazing opportunities building bridges to the future in space,
and the challenge of finding scientists and engineers to help.
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July 13 2021 Solar Program 1-4 PM
North Lakeland Discovery Center
Our audience learned about the Sun and it's connection to planet Earth, then viewed a few small prominences that were bigger than Earth on the limb of the nearest star, and observed a sunspot's "hole" .
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Oct 9th, 2020 Starparty at the
North Lakeland Discovery Center
Success! The skies cooperated for a great night at the North Lakeland Discovery Center Friday Oct 9th. Two telescopes were setup, a 10" and a 12" Dobsonian Newtonian reflector.
We first saw Jupiter with 3 of its 60+ moons. Then IO became visible, coming out from behind the huge planet. Saturn was great too, but the "seeing" toward the horizon stopped us from using higher magnification, we could barely see the rings. Next was the distant M13, the great Globular Cluster in Hercules where over 500,000 stars fill the view of the eyepiece with light that started 23,000 years ago and remain a mystery. Next was M57, the Ring Nebula in Lyra, which looked like a small greenish-blue-gray cheerio or donut shaped object, which is the expanding atmosphere of a star which has turned into a White Dwarf. With binoculars we saw M31, the great Andromeda Galaxy some 2.3 million light years away. At the end the Red Planet Mars was seen brightly in the East.
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"An investment in knowledge pays the best interest."
- Benjamin Franklin