The planet Mars is relatively close to us right now so Right Foot and I went along with the masses to the sixth floor of the car park at Victoria Gardens Shopping Centre last Wednesday to view it through a telescope but we were late and it was cloudy and cold so we gave it up.
The next night, earlier and more warmly dressed we drove out to a park near La Trobe University with another group of hopefuls. Mars looked very pretty when looked at with the naked eye, in its brief periods of visibility. It was another cloudy night and another long wait but eventually we got our 30 seconds each at the telescope. And what did we see? I couldn't quite make out all the features I'd heard about but the polar caps were visible. I could see it was a planet not a star. It looked like a small disc, a communion wafer, pale and translucent.
And we made lots of new friends in the queue just like lining up for finals tickets