The Big Dipper is a great place to look for other galaxies using binoculars. The easiest ones to find are Bode's Galaxy and the Cigar Galaxy. They're next to each other in the sky, making them more conspicuous.

The distance between the stars in our Milky Way Galaxy and beyond are seldom expressed in miles. The numbers would become too astronomical (pun intended).

Light years are the standard measuring stick to the stars. Just one light year, the distance that a beam of light travels in one year's time racing at 186,000 miles per second, is close to six trillion miles. With that pair of binoculars stuck away on a closet shelf or maybe shoved in a drawer somewhere, you have the potential of seeing other galaxies 10, 20, 30 or even 50 million light years beyond the Milky Way.

Admittedly, you'll get a closer look with most telescopes and will definitely see more detail, but with binoculars you can go over a lot of sky in a short amount of time. Most binoculars have a field of view of six to seven degrees wide, roughly the diameter of over a dozen full moons.

One of the best things you can do on a starry summer night is to lay back on the ground — or if you're at my advanced age, on a reclining lawn chair — and randomly scan the skies. You'll run into celestial treasures like colorful double stars, star clusters or other little "smudges" that may be entire other galaxies far, far away, but within arms reach with binoculars.

Seeing these galaxies won't make you jump up and down with their radiant beauty, but knowing that these little smudges are entire other islands of stars, some much larger than the Milky Way, at distances almost impossible to comprehend, makes the hunt worth it. The darker the sky, the greater the chance you have to find these galaxies, but don't expect them to celestially jump out at you.

There are numerous places you can scan in the sky to see other galaxies, and plenty of books and resources to help you find them, but one easy place to troll for them is in and around the Big Dipper. This time of year in the early evening, the Big Dipper is hanging by its handle in the high northwestern sky.

For your first galaxy hunt, try to find the Whirlpool Galaxy, otherwise known as M51. Look about 3½ degrees to the lower left of the star Alkaid, at the end of the Dipper's handle. That's about half the width of the viewing field of most binoculars. Look for an ovalish smudge, which is actually a galaxy over 36 million light years away. The light from the Whirlpool took 36 million years to get to Earth.

Next, look about 5 degrees, or half a viewing field width, to the right of Alkaid for another faint smudge called the Pinwheel Galaxy, or M101. That galaxy is nearly twice the size of our Milky Way and it is estimated to be over 27 million light years away.

I think the easiest galaxies to find around the Big Dipper are Bode's Galaxy, M81, and the Cigar Galaxy, M82. That's because they're right next to each other in the sky, making them a bit more conspicuous. The best way to find these galaxies is to draw a line from the star Phecda, in the lower left corner of the Big Dipper's pot, to Dubhe, at the opposite corner. Then extend that line beyond Dubhe in roughly the same direction and length, about 10 degrees or one field of your binocular field. Look for two smudges next to each other. One of them should have a cylinder shape to it. That's the Cigar Galaxy. Both Bode's and the Cigar galaxies are about 12 million light years away and about 100,000 light years apart.

Again, there are many other areas in the sky to search for faraway galaxies with just your binoculars, and you can check out astronomy books and the Internet for help. One good site is www.astronomy.com.

Just click on the subject "Using Binoculars" in the left margin to find more information. Happy galaxy hunting!

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and author of the book, "Pennsylvania Starwatch," available at bookstores and at his Web site www.lynchandthestars.com.