Eclipse

I took today off work in order to see the eclipse.

It turned out to be a good decision as the clouds kept away and the only thing that got in the way of a perfect view was the fact the branches of the apple tree obstructed things slightly, oh and the minor problem of no glasses so I proceeded to follow the instructions surrounding the use of two pieces of card, one with a pin hole in it. Yes it worked to my surprise.

The last time I came anywhere near an eclipse we were in Spain and we watched it by looking at the reflection in the swimming pool which I have to say was far better than the pinhole method as you saw a lot more.

The BBC coverage was great especially the views from the aircraft. It will be interesting to see tonight's Stargazer programme.

It did not go as dark as expected but the birds went quiet and the temperature dropped as predicted and I can appreciate why people used to think it would be the end of the world.

All this on the first day of Spring!

I was disappointed, it didn't go as dark as I thought it would but did go cold. I also saw one in Spain some years ago, then it went dark with like a purple glow, weird but brilliant.

I think our expectations were based on the widespread pictures in the media of total eclipses.
Anywhere south of the Faroe Islands was going to see a partial eclipse. Even so, despite a worrying amount of early cloud, we had a fair view of the event.

We popped out of work for a few minutes, the cloud cover was just enough to let us see the Eclipse but not to obscure it. this is a picture I managed to get with my phone camera.

That's the best picture I've seen yet.
There was no cloud in Yardley so the sun was too bright to get a decent shot.
I used an Infra Red filter but the results were so full of lens and filter reflections they came out awful.

i watched it...quite good i thought...birds went quiet and it did go much colder...it was much darker out the front than the back of the house...one of my sons watched it through welding goggles..done the job..