I saw the total eclipse of the sun on the Azamara Journey in the middle of the ocean between Iceland and Greenland.  It was not quite under ideal circumstances, but a worthy adventure. For one, it was cloudy.  Also, too cold and windy. But up I went to the 10th deck to join the crowd.   My photos. A video compilation from You Tube. Here is another livestream event from You Tube. I might mention that the above videos will be far better than my reportage tomorrow.  Why? Consider the elements.  Out on the 10th deck, it was freezing ( well, maybe the high 40s ), windy and rocky....the boat was wobbling, standing difficult and walking dangerous. In the Cabaret Lounge, comfortable temperature and color TV viewing from NASA. Oh, floating by was an iceberg. -

This is Total Eclipse of the Sun day.  At noon, here is my view.   Totally cloudy.  Captain announced that he is trying to find a better spot in the ocean between Iceland and Greenland. Tours were available for our next two stops, Grundarfjordur and Isafjordur, Iceland, but a typical tour costs from $300 to $500/person to see ..... what?  We have signed up for a $139 bus tour of Nuuk, Greenland.  That might be it. First Grundarfjordur, located 109 miles northwest of Reykjavik. First to come here were French merchants in 1786. Is a fishing town. Has maybe almost 900 people. Herrings draw Orcas to this location. Features Mount Kirkufell, and Kirkjufellstoss and Grundarfoss waterfalls.  Aurora time? Isafjordur is 254 miles north of Reykjavik. Means ice fjord. located in the northwest corner of Iceland. First settled in 9th century, but took until the 16th century to become a trading post for foreign merchants.  Around this time, witch trials were com...

Some tell me that they read my blog  daily to vicariously enhance their lives.   From an issue of Time magazine I am now reading by Angela Haupt: YOU DON’T NEED TO BOOK A FLIGHT to see the north­ern lights or watch a total solar eclipse to exper­i­ence awe. All you have to do is look up at a sun­set, down at the veins of a leaf, or deep into your morn­ing cof­fee. Exper­i­en­cing just a few minutes of awe a day is linked to less stress, anxi­ety, and depres­sion; lower inflam­ma­tion; less loneli­ness; and more gen­er­os­ity and con­nec­tion, research­ers have found. “I don’t think there’s any­thing you can do that’s bet­ter for you than a few minutes of awe,” says Dacher Kelt­ner, a psy­cho­lo­gist at the Uni­versity of Cali­for­nia, Berke­ley, and author of Awe: The New Sci­ence of Every­day Won­der and How It Can Trans­form Your Life. Awe is the feel­ing you get “when you encounter things that are vast and bey­ond your frame of ref­er­ence,” Kelt­ner says, shift­ing ...