First Contact

1998 Aruba Eclipse   

 

Text Box: TSE 1998 Aruba The fall of 1997 came around and I saw a cheap eclipse excursion mentioned at an Edmonton Chapter Royal Astronomical Society of Canada meeting. The destination was a small island in the Caribbean, Aruba It looked good, and I realized that it was the last easily accessible eclipse to Canada for another 19 years. I had always wanted to see one, so I called up the travel agent and said, Do it! How much? The end of February is typically in the –20 C in the Edmonton area, and stepping into the Caribbean was a bit of paradise. My family of Daniel, (9) Sean (5) and Joanne accompanied me on the trip. The weather was always in the 30C range and water was quite nice. We stayed at the Americana hotel, now the Occidental, which is located on the white sand beach on the north end of the island near the capital, Oranjestad. The food was good and it was fun to sit out doors in shorts and a T shirt over breakfast. I could get used to this. The week of the eclipse was coincidentally the end of Carnival and we saw the great parade. Noisy and crazy, the way you would expect it to be! Great! One of the floats featured the eclipse, and Miss eclipse was spectacular. On the morning of the eclipse, we had planned to go to Baby Beach at the south end of the island to get as much of the 3 minutes and 30 seconds of totality as we could. The weather deteriorated as we drove south, and it looked like a full blown storm. I made the call and headed back to our hotel on the north end of the island, 35 km away. The weather improved as we went north and we had 50% clearings as we approached the hotel. We got first contact just after setting up by the hotel’s poolside bar. Totality caught me by surprise and the experience was dramatic and intense. Jupiter and Mercury were honor guards on either side of the sun. The corona was an electric blue white, unlike anything I had ever seen in a photograph. I cranked off photos, never looking through the telescope but did use my 8x30 binoculars to look at the eclipse. Only later did I see that my mount was not tracking well and the sun drifted off to the edge of the film frame by totality. After the sun came back and the glare chased us back to eclipse glasses and solar filters, I felt a sadness and a loss… Some time later as I was packing up I wondered where the next eclipse was. My first contact Diamond ring ended up in the 1999 RASC calendar. Words and photos do not do an eclipse justice. It is a majestic and awe inspiring moment in time. It is like first love, and equally mysterious. Some become addicted and chase eclipses over the craziest of places. I see them as taking me to places that I would not normally think of going, but I am glad they did.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

94 mm Brandon 2x extender Nikon FA

 

 

 

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Copyright © 2006 Murray D. Paulson