I hope you're having a wonderful Fourth of July weekend, despite gas prices being astronomical!

I also hope you got to enjoy a fireworks show on Friday or Saturday night.

If the sky was clear where you were and you were facing east, you may have noticed a really bright star rising in the low southeastern sky.

That's the king! Meet Jupiter, the king of the planets in our solar system.

Jupiter is in what astronomers call opposition. For Jupiter that occurs every 13 months when the planet is on the opposite side of the sky from the sun, which allows it to be visible all night long.

Just like a full moon, it rises at sunset and sets at sunrise.

Also, Jupiter and Earth are at their closest approach to each other, less than 390 million miles apart.

For the rest of this summer, Jupiter will be the marquee planet for telescope and binocular viewing. I'll have much more about how to enjoy the king of the planets this summer in next week's Starwatch.

As cool as it is watching Jupiter's ascent into our summer skies, there's an even bigger show going on in the western sky this week right at the end of evening twilight.

It's the Saturn-Mars show! If you're a faithful reader of this column, thank you, and please forgive me for repeating some information I gave you last week about this wonderful conjunction. I think it's one of the best astronomical shows this entire year, and it's the closest Saturn and Mars will be to each other in our skies until 2022. Even if you're not really into stargazing, I still think you'll like what you see.

This weekend the show starts out with the help a beautiful new crescent moon. On Saturday night look just to the upper left of the moon and you'll see three bright stars lined up in a tight row.

The first one is actually a star called Regulus which is the brightest star in the constellation Leo the Lion, which looks like a backward question mark leaning on it's right side. Regulus marks the period at the bottom of the question mark.

The next two stars are actually the planets Mars and Saturn.

Mars is just to the upper left of Regulus and Saturn is just to the upper left of Mars.

Without a doubt, Saturn is the brightest of the trio. Sunday night should be an even prettier sight as the moon will be a little fatter and just to the left of Saturn, Mars and Regulus.

Early this coming week, Saturn and Mars will pull away from Regulus and will pull much closer to each other. On Wednesday and Thursday nights they will be in a very tight celestial hug, less than a degree apart.

Pray for clear skies those evenings because this is a must see event, astronomically better than any so-called reality TV! Mars and Saturn are going to be so close that you could barely fit a full moon between them!

You'll certainly be able to fit Mars and Saturn in the same field of view through binoculars and you should be able to do the same with a small telescope with a low magnification eyepiece.

Honestly, though, you won't be able to see many details on Mars. It's just too far at over 200 million miles away. About all you'll see is its distinct orange-red dot.

Saturn, however, will be much more interesting with its contrasting pale yellow coloring and its wonderful ring system.

Even though Saturn is a lot farther away than Mars, at almost 930 million miles from Earth, it's a much larger planet.

Even without the rings, the diameter of Saturn is 75,000 miles, while Mars is only 4000 miles across.

Speaking of Saturn's ring system, it's getting thinner and thinner from our view on Earth. Get a good look at it this week, because when Saturn reappears in our evening skies next winter the ring system will be on edge from our vantage point and will be more or less invisible.

Even if you don't have an optical aid you'll love this great celestial event this week.

The color contrast between the blueish white star Regulus, the red planet Mars, and the yellowish clad Saturn will be very pleasing to the eyes, even if you're watching from a light polluted urban area.

As always though, try to get out in the boonies to really get wowed!

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and is author of the book, "Pennsylvania Starwatch," available at bookstores and at his Web site www.lynchandthestars.com