NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: Frank Reed
Date: 2026 Mar 29, 06:11 -0700
Yes, Sirius is the place to start. And how do we get to Sirius? By following the Belt of Orion. So look at the photo (especially the second version). See the Belt? It's prominently placed. Once you have that you can fill in nearly of the so-called "Winter Hexagon". For example at top center is Aldebaran and the Hyades.
How do we get latitude? It's a low-accuracy two-star fix. Maybe use the scale of Orion's size to make a rough estimate of the altitudes of Sirius and Procyon (or Betelgeuse and Rigel) but I think this works better with stars that are further apart and lower in altitude. After that, it's really just a standard celestial navigation problem, though I would do it by fiddling around in "Stellarium" until the sky matches the measured altitudes. Two altitudes guarantee a latitude.
Frank Reed
