In even the smallest telescopes, the Moon is a wonderful target to observe. On top of that, the visible details change every night as the Moon moves through its phases! That's because the sharpest details are seen at the Terminator, which is the line between light and dark (day and night) on the Moon.Those shadows from lunar sunrise or sunset turn small surface details into dramatically lighted terrain. You can see small details that won't even be visible a couple nights later.

Other great things about the Moon:

• It is not affected by light pollution.
• It is close enough to Earth to show great detail.
• It's visible every clear night except New Moon.
• It's interesting even in binoculars.
• It's the one extraterrestai l body visited by humans.

And no, you cannot see the astronauts' footprints or the abandoned equipment. (Even the Hubble Space Telescope can't do that.) But you can find the areas where all the astronauts landed and identify the largest features — the ones you may remember from listening to all the Apollo news coverage (Sea of Tranquility; Fra Mauro; Hadley Rille; Apennine Mountains).