Mars......

If you have missed your close encounter with the planet Mars this month, here's an upclose and personal view. Amateur astronomers at our planetarium were out last night allowing the public a great chance to see the red planet. The amateur telescopes were impressive, some linked into computers to allow viewing on laptops and to automatically track Mars as it moved across the sky. The photo above was taken by simply [and carefully] applying my digital camera to the viewing piece of a rather large instrument. Note the ice cap at the north pole!