Today:
The planet Mars is obviously on the move, sliding to a position exactly even with the Twin stars of Gemini this evening, high in the southwest, forming a curious “belt” of three stars in a row, mimicing the more famous Orion’s Belt, which appears one quarter of the way up from the horizon as darkness falls between 8:30 and 9 o’clock. Mars continues it journey east, encountering the star Regulus, in Leo, the Lion this June.
Friday:
The waxing Gibbous Moon is just one day from being Full, known is April as the “Pink” Moon. This is a great time to see one of the Moon’s prominent craters, Tycho. Binoculars show it near the bottom as a hub for a series of lines radiating outward, or “rays”, caused when a meteor crashed into the Moon 110 million years ago.
Saturday:
This evening, almost exactly as the Sun sets, the Full “Pink” Moon rises in the east. The Moon is perfectly Full less than an hour later, at 8:22 PM, at which point you migh glimpse the steely-blue star Spica, just barely to the Moon’s upper left. The Moon actually passes in front of this star as seen from South America, called a lunar occultation. This Full Moon is known as the “Pink” Moon after the wild pink ground phlox, native to areas farther south than here.