On June 8th, 2004, for the first time since 1882, the planet Venus
passed in front of the Sun as seen from Earth. This spectacle is not
only rare, it's about the only opportunity one ever gets to see
another planet with the unaided eye as a spot, not a
dot. Fourmilab was blessed with almost equally rare
cloudless skies for this event, which permitted capturing the images
presented on this page.