We had a family BBQ birthday party for yours truly on Saturday night and I decided to retrieve my seldom used telescope from storage and set it up for the first time in the two years since we moved away from Scotland. My 9 year old niece was keen to get a good look at the moon through a telescope for the first time and we also caught a great glimpse of Mars sitting low in the southern sky after around 9pm, check your horizon around then and you'll see a orangey-red coloured star. Mars is currently approaching its closest position to Earth for thousands of years, so there's never been a better time to get a hold of a scope and take a look.
Through the scope we were able to make out some grey-ish definition and a very defined ice-cap shown as a bright white spot around the 9 o'clock position on the disc. It's the clearest I've ever seen Mars in my short and very amatuer career as a kid-on astronomer.
Through the scope we were able to make out some grey-ish definition and a very defined ice-cap shown as a bright white spot around the 9 o'clock position on the disc. It's the clearest I've ever seen Mars in my short and very amatuer career as a kid-on astronomer.