Look to the West, shortly after sunset and you will firstly see Venus, the Saturn and Mars will appear somewhat fainter and apparently further from the Sun.

Over the next month or two, you can keep track of the ballet of these planets in the evening sky. Venus will rise up past Saturn and Mars, before all three planets sink into the twighlight glow. What is really happening of course is Venus is undertaking us on an inside orbit, while we are burning off both Saturn and Mars on the outside orbits.

Anyways its a great time to not only identify these planets but to get a feel for their movement too.

As for if you actually want to take a look at these things. 3in (~80mm) is probably the smallest scope you will want to consider. That will show you the rings of Saturn, and the phases of Venus over the next few months. Mars is v. small at the moment, and I couldnt really even resolve it as a disk, but at its closest it will show some detail on Mars. It will give spectacular views of the Moon, and will show the moons of Jupiter and detail on Jupiter.

The cheapest I could find a scope like this is the ‘Firstscope’. Celestron made them for the ‘2009 year of astronomy’ and I think there is a surplus, cos the are now selling them on amazon for about $35.

Bigger scopes will show you more, but to be honest you will need to learn how to use a scope first, and something like the Firstscope will give you this feel.