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WHAT TO SEE
Like nearby Saturn, Jupiter and Neptune, Uranus is a planet made almost entirely of gas.
A blue hue
The atmosphere is mostly hydrogen and helium, with small quantities of methane. It's the methane that absorbs the red light from the Sun's ray, giving the planet its distinct blue colour.
The weather
To the naked eye, Uranus is a fairly featureless planet. However, enhanced telescope images show seasonal changes in the planet's atmosphere during the year.
SPOTTING URANUS FROM THE EARTH
Uranus can occasionally be spotted with the naked eye, if you know where to look. But it's hard as it looks very similar to the background of stars.
Even with a small telescope, Uranus can be hard to find. Through larger telescopes, it appears as a greenish disc, without any distinguishing marks.
LOCAL HISTORY
Uranus was not known in the ancient world. It was the first planet to be discovered with the aid of a telescope.
When Wilhelm Herschel spotted it in 1781, he named it "the Georgium Sidus" (the Georgian Planet). It was later given the name Uranus (the Greek god of the heavens), to continue the tradition of naming planets after Classical gods.
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TRAVEL INFORMATION
Journey time · 8.5 Earth years
1 Uranian year · 84.0 Earth years
Contacting home · Time lag = 319.5 minutes
Before you leave
Make sure you time your trip well. Other planets spin around an axis that is perpendicular to their direction of travel. But Uranus is tipped on its side and spins in the same direction as it travels. So it rolls around its orbit.
No one knows for certain what happened to Uranus to make it like this.
This means that each of Uranus' poles faces away from the Sun for half of the planet's orbit. So each pole alternates between nights and days that last for 42 years.
When you arrive
Like the gaseous giants Jupiter and Saturn, Uranus has a system of rings. They are so dark however, that even visitors to the Uranian system will not be able to see them directly. The only way to spot them is by observing as they block the light of stars beyond.
 Discover what Saturn's famous rings are made from
Uranus has no distinct surface on which to land. But it's thought that Uranus has a core of rock and ice.
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