My interest in astronomy began a long ago. When I was 10 years old - and therefore more or less in 1966 - I got from my father rotating map of the sky and a few editions of "Urania"- astronomical monthly.  Because in those days to have a real telescope or binoculars belonged to the realm of dreams, I’ve built the first telescope with a spherical lens and eyepiece with a focal length of 10 mm from the microscope. I remember I was in the Warsaw Department of PTMA (Polish Amateurs Astronomical Society) in the Botanical Garden and we’ve been very excited when the Pleiades were covered by the Moon, which allowed us to calculate the distance from Earth to it’s satellite in cooperation with colleagues from other branches of PTMA....

Then there was a long pause intermittent episodes of allowing use of the knowledge of astronomy in navigation for sailing and watching the sky from my cottage on the bank of Bug River...

And now ..... from 2008 back time and opportunities allows me to develop interest in astronomy and astrophotography. My pictures and descriptions of equipment can be found in other sections of this page. In the "Gallery" I am also presenting the most interesting  photos from my travels  and archives.

I think this is a good place to thank my family for the incredible patience with which they tolerate my night rendezvous with the stars and Kuba Roszkiewicz  for transfer of huge portions of knowledge about astrophotography and constructive criticism of my accomplishments.

Maciej Kapkowski