On the map below you will see our Solar System Series follows a rough line north to south along the Cambrian Mountains of Mid Wales and covers 40 miles using 1 mile to 1 astronomical unit, which itself equals 93 million miles. When finding the caches you will also notice we have chosen cache sizes relative to the size of the planets etc.
The picture below shows the relative size and positions of the objects in our series, which starts with Sol near Dylife then travels in a southerly direction nearly 40 miles to end with Pluto near Llanwrda just south-west of Llandovery.
There are 15 caches in all, as we have included the first four Asteroids to be discovered and a famous Comet. We have also included Pluto, as most people have grown up learning that Pluto was a planet, though now demoted to dwarf planet status.
Jupiter is by far the largest planet in our Solar System and also the fastest rotator, spinning on it's axis in about ten hours at the equator. The Earth could fit inside Jupiter more than 1000 times.
Jupiter is a very stormy planet, there are storms found throughout the atmosphere and most of the storms seem to never end. The many different cloud formations and storms in the atmosphere also make Jupiter a very colourful planet. Jupiter's Great Red Spot, visible in the picture above to the right, is where a giant storm has been raging for at least 300 years. This red spot is also called "The Eye of Jupiter" because of its shape. The storm's super hurricane winds blow across an area larger than the planet Earth.
Jupiter, with at least 16 satellites, is a mini solar system. Several of it's satellites are as large as small planets. It is likely that Jupiter has other satellites that have not been discovered yet.
The four satellites that can be viewed easily in binoculars or a small telescope are Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. Called the Galilean satellites, for they were amongst the first objects discovered by Galileo with his newly invented astronomical telescope in 1610.
When deciding where to place our Solar System series we thought of using the Cambrian Mountain Ridge as a guideline to give Geocachers a scenic route and to give suitable cache sites with interest. We chose to start the series with Sol at it's northern end near the Star Inn because of the connection... Sol being our nearest 'star'.
Here Jupiter is 5.2 miles away from Sol and you are on the Severn Way and at Pont y Greufron the Nant Sarn cuts a narrow gorge through the bedrock under the bridge on it's way to join the River Severn in the valley below.
We hope you enjoy our Welsh Solar System series...D&W If you are interested in Astronomy here in the Dark Skies of the Cambrian Mountains then check out our Mid Wales Astronomy fb page ... www.facebook.com/midwalesastronomy