No telescope required

All of the stars that you see in the night sky are part of the Milky Way galaxy, and some part of it is visible every night. But when people speak of seeing the Milky Way with the naked eye, they usually mean the cloud-like stretch of stars that can only be seen in especially clear skies. Unless you live way out in the sticks, a good glimpse of our cosmic neighborhood requires a little travel to less light-polluted locales like Yosemite National Park.