In late October, low in the northwestern sky, you can make out a constellation called Bootes, the hunting farmer. Bootes looks more like a giant kite than anything else, but legend has it that he's chasing Ursa Major, the big bear that we've talked about in past Skywatch columns.

To the upper left of Bootes is the Corona Borealis constellation. The outline reminds me of a cereal bowl, but it is actually supposed to be a crown or tiara — something Miss America might wear after winning the pageant.

Now Corona Borealis isn't much of a constellation. Some stargazers refer to it as "Cor Bore" because it is void of any star clusters, galaxies or nebulae.

The brightest star at the bottom of the bowl is Alphecca, a bluish-white star four times the size of our sun. It is about 430 trillion miles away — which is in our neighborhood, astronomically speaking. The light you see tonight when gazing at Alphecca left that star around 1929.

Corona Borealis has an interesting and romantic mythological story behind it.

Princess Ariadne was the daughter of evil King Minos. After she helped a young man named Theseus kill her father's Minotaur, she was forced to flee to the island of Naxos with her new beau.

No one really knows why, but Theseus ditched Ariadne when they got there and the princess was left sobbing uncontrollably on the beach.

Now it just so happened that Naxos was ruled by Bacchus, the god of wine. Bacchus saw Ariadne and took pity on her. After awhile he fell in love with the beautiful princess and eventually the two got married.

On their wedding night, Bacchus took off his crown and, with all his might, threw it high into the air. Legend has it that it flew so high it sprouted stars and became Corona Borealis. Bacchus told his wife that it was her eternal crown symbolizing their everlasting love.

Now top that one guys!

Earth and Mars are drawing closer to each other in what's called an orbital opposition.Right now, Mars is about 43.7 million miles away and will be even closer next week. Just like a full moon, Mars rises at sunset and sets at sunrise, making it available to view all night long. It is by far the brightest star-like object in the sky, rising high above the eastern horizon by 7:30 p.m.It is also a tempting telescope target, but wait until after 9:30 p.m. before you take a look. Otherwise you'd be gazing through a lot more of Earth's atmosphere and that can really muddy up the image. Once Mars is high enough and the sky is clear enough, you may see polar ice caps and the dark splotches that are part of Mars' vast canyon system.Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio on Minneapolis and author of the new book, "Pennsylvania Starwatch," available at bookstores and at his Web sitewww.lynchandthestars.com