A Grand Tour.

"All I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by..."

It was announced today that after thirteen months in a delicate orbit, the NASA space probe Dawn fires its revolutionary ion drive and leaves the asteroid Vesta on course for the mission's final destination: the dwarf planet Ceres.

Despite having the limelight stolen by recent robotic voyages to the planet Mars, Dawn's patient reconnaissance has revealed that these largest of these irregular bodies are geologically almost like planets in their own right - and are the remnants of the original bodies that came together at the creation of the solar system to form their larger siblings 4.6 billion years ago.

I can't wait to see the first tantalising pictures of this new world when this plucky little probe arrives at Ceres in early 2015.