Two Celestial Bodies

Here are two pictures I took on June 5th 2012, between 3 and 8pm. The big whitish dot you might recognize as our Sun.

The tiny black dot is a planet. Can you guess which one? Yup, its Venus. 

On the top pictures you might even see faint sun spots. The bottom pictures is a touch more orange. The ghostly clouds in that picture are merely fingerprint smudges on my camera's solar filter, nothing more. 

The following pictures are from NASA using big fancy telescopes and weird filters. But they're interesting.

And yes, Venus is about the same size as the earth, only closer to the sun. And I hear its hotter than Hades there too. 

Venus transits are one of the most rare celestial phenomenon. They happen in pairs, 8 years apart, and each 'pair' appearance happens once ever 100 years or so. The last time in 2004, and the next time in December 2117 and December 2125. So I can safely say that that will be the only time that my eyes will ever see such an event.