Ok, maybe not as dramatic as the title would suggest but still Santorini is a geo-active volcano system so I'm going to claim that one.
So as some of you may know we have just returned from holidays in Crete and went to Santorini for the transit, the whole place was spectacular. Truly a worthy place for witnessing such a special event. We witnessed some great sights too while we were there, the rising of a near full blood red moon and the dramatic sunsets but that's for another thread possibly.
We stayed in a hotel villa high on the rim of the caldera and had a perfect view eastward over the ocean, the weather leading up had been perfect and the morning before I had a succesful trial run in clear conditions and had everything worked out. Settings were honed, best location found etc...
However, that evening some disturbing developments were afoot which left me feeling a bit uneasy.
You guessed it, cloud.
It was the type of cloud that only forms at the top of mountains and nowhere else, lenticular I think. So to my disgust this was the scen that I awoke to in the morning.
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7236/7...0bc9739d_z.jpg
Unbelieveable, there had not been a cloud in sight for are whole trip or the days after.
Thankfully though as you may be able to see(I do have better pics of the effect) there was a thin strip of clear air between the horizon and the cloud which was situated right over my head, although at the time I wasn't sure how it was going to play out.
So it was now a waiting game to see what would happen next.
Then at precisely 6:02am local time a first glimmer of orange began to peek over the horizon, YES!!!! I was going to be able to see it.
My first few shots however were way out... the change of seeing had dramatically changed the settings I had figured out a day before and this played havoc throughout the transit and my plans. But still I had some degree of success and I am thrilled to be able to of captured and share with you some of the photos I took.
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7214/7...75f717ff_c.jpg
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7213/7...6bc1bc85_c.jpg
Santorini Transit by
Jarrod Bennett, on Flickr
I do have some white light pics as well which I'll post when I get around to checking all the SD cards. There was a good 30 min or so chunk of the transit that I missed due to the clouds as the Sun got higher but it reappered towards the end so I'll go through it all and see what I can come up with.
It's also worth mentioning that the Polarie performed reasonably well on it's solar tracking rate too.
All in all I'm ectstatic to have seen such a special event.
Jarrod.
edit: Sorry, I'll get the pictures uploaded in a minute.
edit2: Done.
