It’s a big day for NASA. On August 25, 1989, the Voyager 2 spacecraft first reached Neptune’s orbit, some 2.75 billion miles from Earth. Now, NASA celebrates an anniversary milestone: The piano-sized New Horizons craft has reached Neptune’s orbit exactly 25 years later – and in record time, to boot. The probe made the impossibly long trek in just eight years and eight months.

Next stop? Pluto, with an encounter planned for July 14, 2015.

“It’s a cosmic coincidence that connects one of NASA’s iconic past outer solar system explorers, with our next outer solar system explorer,” said Jim Green, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division, NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Exactly 25 years ago at Neptune, Voyager 2 delivered our ‘first’ look at an unexplored planet. Now it will be New Horizons’ turn to reveal the unexplored Pluto and its moons in stunning detail next summer on its way into the vast outer reaches of the solar system.”

While New Horizons is much further from Neptune itself than Voyager 2 ever was (nearly 2.5 billion miles), it was still able to capture some impressive shots on July 10 using high-tech camera equipment.

What’s especially cool is that some junior members of the Voyager 2 team are now senior members of the New Horizons team, and they say they’re just as excited now about Pluto and its moons as they were 25 years ago about Neptune and Triton.

“The feeling 25 years ago was that this was really cool, because we’re going to see Neptune and Triton up-close for the first time,” said Ralph McNutt of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, who leads the New Horizons energetic-particle investigation and served on the Voyager plasma-analysis team. “The same is happening for New Horizons. Even this summer, when we’re still a year out and our cameras can only spot Pluto and its largest moon as dots, we know we’re in for something incredible ahead.”

The Voyager 2 mission provided ample surprises when giving us our first up-close look at Neptune and Triton, including the first images of its Great Dark Spot and its ring system, previously undetectable from Earth. This time, the speculation is to what degree Pluto will resemble Triton once scientists receive a better view. Recently restored video footage of Triton shot by Voyager 2 has the NASA team giddy with anticipation over the possible similarities.

“No country except the United States has the demonstrated capability to explore so far away,” said Alan Stern, New Horizons principal investigator at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.. “The U.S. has led the exploration of the planets and space to a degree no other nation has, and continues to do so with New Horizons. We’re incredibly proud that New Horizons represents the nation again as NASA breaks records with its newest, farthest and very capable planetary exploration spacecraft.”