Spain by Andrew Hinds
October 3, 2005
October 3, 2005
October 3rd of 2005 saw an annular eclipse cut across Spain and into Africa. Eclipse chaser Andrew Hinds was on the scene to record this splendid event. He reported that there were a few fellow eclipse chasers in the area and more gathered to gander at the event as the day went on.
Here is Andrew's report fresh from his travels:
Of course having only arrived in Madrid on the Sunday evening we didn't have a clue where we were going to view the eclipse from,so it was going to be a bit frantic finding a spot unless we came across like minded souls who were here before us.
We didn't see any eclipse chasers until we were walking down a street looking for a bar,and one of them read my t-shirt and I thought great we're in luck! There were only three of them and they were from Switzerland and one of them had been pick pocketed and had all of his money nicked! But they gave us the best location and we went down there in the morning so panic over... So the next morning with great anticipation we got up and got our stuff together and headed off for our quarry with breakfast on the way.
It was a bit of a walk to the viewing location, and as usual when I wanted to go racing off and get a spot as quickly as possible so I could set up and we could settle down but I was racing around to fast for my other half Sue so I had to hold back just a teensy little bit....Funny how excitement does that to an allegedly grown man..
Anyway we got to our location and it was spot on! It was the Parque del Retiro in the Bourbon area about a mile and a half from our hotel and when we got there I was expecting a lot more people than there was there but it was still only about 9 AM so ther was still a little more time to go.
We settled down between some German astronomers and an English couple who knew nothing about photographing eclipses so I had to give the husband some off the cuff advice on eclipse photography and I even lent him a filter as his was totally useless.
I didn't even know what time first contact was but the Germans told me it was at 9.40 local time so we were well early,but while we waited more people turned up,some with telescopes and cameras and some who were total amateurs including a guy and his girlfriend who had an old Zenit with a short telephoto lens with a piece of black and white exposed film loosely taped onto the front. I thought it would be a good idea to light a nice big Cohiba cigar to while away the time.
About 9.40 all attention was focussed onto the scopes and cameras and as usual at these events at the specific moment up goes the shout "First Contact!" from all around, and there just between 12 and 1 O'clock position the moon made its presence known, funny how first contact goes like that, I was expecting the two O'lock position or thereabouts according to my computer simulation, funny how they never go as anticipated, still, at least it wasn't cloudy.
After about 45 mins a nice crowd had started to gather in the park and I was quite surprised that some people were totally oblivious as to what was going on. A Scottish couple asked why all the people were here and I spent the next several minutes having to explain it all to them,and show them the pictures on my digital camera screen!
I was fortunate enough on this occasion to have two digital cameras and a DV camcorder to record events so I took the opportunity to record some of the other phenomena associated with eclipses like pinhole projections through trees which considering where I had been before for previous eclipses was a bit of a first and having instant results was a godsend and of course the strange effects eclipses have on shadows!!
On the onset of annularity it didn't really get that dark and the sun was still too bright to see the "ring of fire" without protection, mind you it would have been nice to feel the ring of fire as during that period of annularity my hands were quite cold!
When the sun came back out it got nice and warm again and I was able to answer the call of nature as I'd been dying to for ages, this gave me an opportunity to see other people's equipment while on my way to the servicias. Just the usual array of telescopes and cameras etc except for one...What were the eggs for????Answers anyone??
Anyway there was now no rush,I was determined to see this eclipse right through to fouth contact which was very leisuerly and was one of the few of the last ones to pack up and carry on with normality.
It was overall a very interesting experience, nowhere near as frantic as a total eclipse,and it gave me a few ideas on how to optimize my equipment for eclipse photography, the equipment being a Nikon D70 digital SLR fitted with a Tamron Di 200-500mm zoom lens, effective focal length 300-760mm using a photographic ND filter grade 4(i think) and covered with Baader film. and a Fuji Finepix S7000 for the other pictures.
So....Armed with a wealth of new knowledge under my hair I could only see in my mind's eye a dark sky, an eerie pearly white corona, prominences of hydrogen and a scattering of brighter stars and hopefully me not cursing in a loud and colourful manner if my equipment decides to have a mind of it's own on the day!
Heres to March 2006!!!!
