The sparkling blue-white star Spica acts as your guide to the Omega Centauri cluster, a globular cluster bright enough to see with the eye alone, in a dark sky.
Stay up after midnight, or rise before the sun these next few mornings, to see the moon, Saturn and Mars - and possibly, some of Eta Aquariid meteors streaking past in moonlight.
You can't miss Venus. It's the brightest thing in the west after sunset. Aldebaran - the eye of the Bull in Taurus - needs a darker sky. Wait some minutes! It'll pop into view.
From the Southern Hemisphere, these next weeks are your best opportunity of 2018 to spot the sun's innermost planet, Mercury. From the Northern Hemisphere ... not so much.
Just as earthly coordinates help travelers, so celestial coordinates guide sky explorers. Tonight, meet Earth's celestial equator ... simply Earth's equator projected onto the great dome of sky.
Bruce McClure served as lead writer for EarthSky's popular Tonight pages from 2004 to 2021, when he opted for a much-deserved retirement. He's a sundial aficionado, whose love for the heavens has taken him to Lake Titicaca in Bolivia and sailing in the North Atlantic, where he earned his celestial navigation certificate through the School of Ocean Sailing and Navigation. He also wrote and hosted public astronomy programs and planetarium programs in and around his home in upstate New York.