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Scientists and amateur astronomers alike celebrated the arrival of the Transit of Venus on Tuesday, peering up to the skies to watch a dark black dot slide over the surface of the sun.

Those taking part were seeing what has only been seen eight times since the invention of the telescope -- the image of Venus, a slithering period, blocking just a smidgen of the light from our solar system's star. Astronomers were watching the celestial event from all corners of Earth -- from California to Hawaii to Australia to India.

At Griffith Observatory, crowds of onlookers peered through telescopes to catch one of the rarest of planetary alignments, which won't be seen again until 2117.

FULL COVERAGE: TRANSIT OF VENUS

"To hear it and see it are two different experiences... It's that little dot you won't ever see in our lifetimes again," said Lee Flicker, 56, of Hancock Park.

Lenore Perry, 42, of Santa Monica, was less enthralled with the sight of a dot on the sun. "It doesn't look overwhelmingly wild. But when you think about what it is, it's rare and extraordinary."

One of the best parts of Transit of Venus was coming up at 6:27 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time, when the planet was set to be at the midpoint of the sun. The show will continue until sunset in the continental U.S., but will go on in Asia, western Africa and most of Europe until about 9:47 p.m. PDT.

At Mt. Wilson above the San Gabriel Valley, astronomers gathered beneath a blue sky with only occasional wisps of clouds breezing by to celebrate the historic transit.

The last time the Transit of Venus was viewable anywhere on Earth was 2004, but it wasn't viewable on the U.S. West Coast. Before Tuesday, the last time Los Angeles could have seen the Transit of Venus was in 1882.

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Venus transit dazzles viewers around the world