August 12, 2026

August 12, 2026

Aimee and I have apparently become Solar Eclipse Chasers. We serendipitously saw an annular eclipse on October 14, 2023, and then we purposely traveled two years ago, on April 8, 2024 to see our first Total Eclipse. Then last minute we signed up for this Eclipse Cruise. The path of totality runs from Iceland down the Atlantic and across Spain. In Spain it will be a sunset eclipse. At our location the totality will be at 8:27 pm, about an hour before it gets dark.

At 9 am we attended another ship presentation on the eclipse. Aimee and I are both hoping this is better than the earlier Smithsonian lady “scientist” we listened to earlier. This one was by a NYC weatherman. He was excellent. I even learned a few things, especially about the Saros cycles of eclipse shadows. Once back on deck, I see we are completely cloud covered. I hope this weatherman will work his magic.

This is mostly another sea day as our ship travels up the coast of Spain and out into the Atlantic Ocean. I always thought Spain dry and sunny. Apparently the Northwest of Spain is very rainy because of the mountains in Galicia. As the day progresses, and we get farther from the coast the skies clear. We spent much of the afternoon in the main lounge watching the sun-starved play on the pool deck.

Since the eclipse will occur at sunset, it will mostly be visible on only one side of the ship. Not unexpectedly many cruisers are already staking out spots along the starboard side many hours before. We have a nice leisurely dinner and then find a spot an hour before the big event. While we watch the moon turn the sun into a crescent, we observe the shadows on the ship behind us. It is quite amazing how the shadows become blurry and pinholes turn crescent-shaped.

I took too many photos during our last eclipse. Since this one is less than two minutes long, I resist taking more than a couple photos. Wow! The visual of seeing the sun blotted out with our naked eyes is truly a sight to behold. We can easily see a huge solar prominence emanating from the left side of the sun. Aimee loves the diamond ring eclipse finish. This was the finest evening entertainment our ship could have provided.