The closest point on this curve to the stick will be a perfect north/south line.įor natural navigation purposes, midday is the moment that the sun is highest in the sky, not what your watch says. By marking the end of a stick’s shadow tips over the course of the middle part of the day and joining them, a curve is made. The shortest shadow cast by a stick each day will form a perfect north-south line anywhere in the world and this happens at midday. The next stage in using the sun to find your way is being confident which direction the sun will be at midday. If you take it to the extreme, then in the Arctic Circle in June the sun rises so far north of east and sets so far north of west that these points actually overlap – in other words the sun doesn’t set. The greater your latitude and the closer you are to one of the solstices, the further from east and west the sun rises and sets. The exact bearing of sunrise and sunset is determined by your latitude and the time of year. When it comes to sunset, the Poles are still tilted the same way as in the morning and so in midsummer the sun sets close to northwest, and in midwinter it sets close to southwest. The difference between sunrise directions in midsummer and midwinter is a whopping 90 degrees! Similarly in late December it will rise much closer to southeast than east. It will be close to northeast in Britain in late June. This means that in the middle of a UK summer, when the North Pole is tilted towards the sun, the sun will rise north of east, and we are not talking about a couple of degrees. On midwinter’s day, around December 22 each year (the winter solstice), the South Pole is tilted as much as possible towards the sun. This is why it is summer in the northern hemisphere and winter in the southern. On midsummer’s day in the northern hemisphere, around June 21st each year (the summer solstice), the North Pole is tilted as much as it ever will be towards the sun.

The answers lie in the tilt of the Earth as it moves around the sun.

Estimate time until sunset by sun