Jupiter and Venus

We here on the good ship Earth are 92 million miles (147 million kilometres) from the sun and of course we are the third planet out as the wacky TV series reminds us. Number two is Venus at 67 million miles (107 million kms). That's it to the right of the shot. Mars of course is next. Number 5 is Jupiter at 483 million miles (772 million kms) and it appears on the left of the frame.

The numbers are quite staggering. These two planets are roughly 416 Million miles apart, that's 665 million kms. Yet they appear to the naked eye tonight like as if they are dancing a duet together in the sky and in a few days time they will come to within 3 degrees of one another. I think they begin to separate again after that. Depending on where you are in the world and the time of night, you may be able to see this pair, the moon and another planet (Uranus I think but I haven't double checked that) all close enough to one another to shoot in the one frame.

Happy hunting.