Nearly every meteor shower asks you to be awake at three in the morning. The Draconids do not: the radiant is highest as the sky goes dark, so the best hour is the one right after dinner. The moon is a four percent crescent that does not rise until quarter to five, which means the sky is as black as it gets all month.
Before you go
- Go out as it gets dark on the 8th: this shower fades as the night goes on, it does not build
- Face north and give your eyes twenty minutes with no phone
- Ten an hour is the good-sky number, so it is a lie-down-and-wait, not a fireworks display
What we checked, and when
Read off the venue's own page on 2026-09-11.
Free in the garden. Big Lagoon State Park is $6 a vehicle and darker, and a Florida veteran pass gets you in free.
The Draconids are unpredictable. Most years give a handful an hour a few years in a century they storm. Ten an hour is the honest expectation.
This one rewards an early night rather than a late one, which is the opposite of the Perseids and the Orionids.