Allan Stocks, age 9 of Victoria, B.C., Canada, for his question:

How long does it take Pluto to orbit the sun?

Pluto pedals around the outside edge of the solar system, and the icy little planet has a long, long way to go. What's more, for a planet, it travels at a snail's pace of three miles a second. The earth orbits the sun at 18 1/2 miles a second. It takes us 365 days to make one yearly orbit around the sun. It takes faraway Pluto 248 earth years to orbit the sun.

A year on Pluto is equal to 248 years on earth. Its orbit is oval shaped so that sometimes it is nearer and sometimes farther from the sun. During part of its long year it is separated from the sun by 4.567 billion miles. It is never closer to the sun than 2.766 billion miles.