For the next week, the telescope in your attic is your window to the wonders of the Milky Way.

Telescopes are incredible. Just looking through the eyepiece can take you on a journey from your backyard to the depths of space. It’s a powerful experience – simultaneously informing us about mankind’s brilliance and insignificance – that I wish everyone on the planet could share.

Yet their inventor, Hans Lippershey, believed telescopes would be a tool for national security – spotting invading ships and armies. It took Galileo Galilei’s genius to point his telescope up. Four hundred years later we’re celebrating his seminal discoveries of 1609 as part of the International Year of Astronomy (IYA).

For three days, beginning October 22, people around the world will be invited to take part in a global celebration of Galileo’s discoveries. The Galilean Nights festival will give millions of people the chance to feel the same sense of awe and wonder that Galileo must have felt.

Among other things, Galileo discovered the phases of Venus, the moons around Jupiter, as well as the craters and mountains on the Moon. The festival will focus on giving people views of these objects, with Jupiter as the crown jewel. High in the evening sky to the south, it is a radiant and unmistakable sight. Even a small telescope will show the cloud bands and the “Galilean Moons” Io, Europa, Ganymeade, and Callisto.

Other planets won't be as easy to see. Venus, in particular, will be a challenge. It will be a “morning object” in October, so you’ll have to get up an hour before sunrise to see it. But wipe the sleep from your eyes because the view will be worth it! Venus, Saturn, and the Orionids meteor shower will stage a pageant in the predawn sky on the October 21. The Orionids, a cosmic cloud of debris left by Halley's Comet, can produce spectacularly showy fireballs.

Despite requiring international coordination, the Galilean Nights festival wasn’t part of the original plans for the International Year of Astronomy. It was inspired by the overwhelming success of the “100 hours of Astronomy” event in April. In Halifax, a collective of local amateur and professional astronomers – Astronomy Nova Scotia – organized 16 events during the “100 hours” celebration. Our members were out in force at mall displays, on radio phone-ins, running observing sessions, as well as giving public talks. Similar events happened across the globe. It was tiring, but hugely enjoyable.

Speaking as a professional astronomer, the IYA has been an amazing experience. Watching the joy on people’s faces when they first see Saturn’s rings or the bands on Jupiter never grows old. The spectacular images from the Hubble Space Telescope pale in comparison to seeing these incredible sights with your own eyes. You won’t see the mind-blowing detail Hubble provides, but the light from those objects, carried in minute particles called photons, has travelled an incredible distance, and the journey ends in your eyeball. That’s amazing, however you think about it.

It has also been fun to answer people’s questions about the universe. At Saint Mary’s University we’ve been running a series of public talks about different aspects of astronomy and astrophysics. The response has been overwhelming – people have been literally sitting in the aisles. I’ve witnessed swarms of enthusiastic people descend on the speaker after a talk. Sometimes the questioning that ensues runs on for close to an hour. Even if I feel empathy for the cornered speaker – answering questions might be fun, but it is also exhausting – it’s heart-warming to know that a sense of curiosity about the universe is alive and kicking beyond our campus walls.

But the IYA isn’t just about reaching out to the public. Canadian astronomers are about to embark on planning the next decade of astronomical research. The result, a list of projects we believe to be critically important, will appear in a document we call the Long Range Plan. Headed by Dr. Christopher Pritchet from the University of Victoria, the plan will not be easy to develop. We have so many capable researchers in Canada that inevitably some outstanding projects will not be funded. Egos will be hurt; arguments will ensue.

Few Canadians are aware of just how brilliant some of our astronomers are. We have a storied history of discovery and development, from the first determination of the coldness of space to designing some of the most optically perfect telescopes on the planet. A 10-year study released in 2005 ranked Canadian astronomy number one in the world on the basis of the average number of citations our professional papers receive, in other words, how much influence our research has on others. We might be a small community compared to the United States, but we punch like a heavyweight.

With the Galilean Nights festival almost upon us, preparations from Halifax to Hangzhou are in full swing. Expect to see quite a bit of media coverage. Even President Obama hosted a star party at the White House on October 7. Would Prime Minister Harper consider doing the same on the lawns of 24 Sussex Drive?

During all these preparations, I can’t help but wonder what Galileo would think if we could bring him to the present day – what would he say about our discoveries? No doubt he’d be left speechless by the sheer enormity of modern telescopes and amazed by our knowledge. But you don’t need to be 400 years old to share in those feelings. Just let some photons from Jupiter end their journey in your eyeball. And become part of you.