During the summer in Yosemite National Park, astronomers gather on some weekends on Glacier Point, at 7200', far above Yosemite Valley. From Glacier Point, viewers can see Half Dome from a different angle than the commonly photographed valley view. But that is not all you can see...for on these dark summer nights, over twenty astronomers are known to gather with just as many very powerful telescopes.

During the new moon, I ventured up there, and was very much rewarded. The astronomers, some professional and some amateur, were very friendly, offering views through their telescopes. I saw many spectacular nebulae, including the Cat's Eye, Lagoon, and Omega Nebulae. The Ring Nebula was one of my favorites, looking rather like a great smoke ring in the sky. It's a planetary nebula, 2150 light years distant, which formed after a red giant shed its outer envelope.

I took in the Andromeda Galaxy along with two of its satellite galaxies, all part of the Local Group of galaxies, to which our Milky Way also belongs. I saw the Whirlpool Galaxy, and thrilled to the sight of Uranus, which shone a deep blue in the telescope.

But by far the most exciting part for me was seeing three asteroids. Actual asteroids -- it was a first for me, and it gives you an idea of the power of these telescopes that they can see an object only a 100 miles across as far away as Jupiter and Mars.

These asteroids orbit in the Asteroid belt between our fourth and fifth planets. I saw Hebe, Eunomia and huge Ceres, the asteroid that almost became a planet a few months ago in the same movement that proposed a total of 12 planets for our solar system. As you all know, this ended up going the opposite direction, actually demoting Pluto, and reducing our planets to 8. Ceres was originally thought to be a planet in the 1800s, but was demoted itself in the twentieth century. It is now considered a "minor planet" by the new criteria put in place in August 2006. Observations of Ceres by the Hubble have hinted to astronomers that the mantle of Ceres, which wraps around its core, may consist of water ice.

It was a magical time, out there under the glittering stars, peering into the expanse of the universe.