Seven+7 Wonders of the World!

In celebration of two personal milestones

 

“I would rather have a mind opened by wonder than one closed by belief.”

― Gerry Spence

 

 

Two days after viewing the Great North American Eclipse of 08Apr24, my seventh total or annular solar eclipse, I completed another personal milestone – seeing all seven wonders of the world! This is mainly a chronological account of my journeys to these manmade wonders determined by popular choice, beginning with the Taj Mahal in India in 1963, and ending with Chichén Itzá in Mexico last month.

 

Prologue

It is rather fortuitous that I could view the last of my seven manmade wonders of the world immediately following my seventh consecutive successful viewing of total/annular solar eclipses, the two together spanning over six decades.  This article, focusing primarily on the former, is in celebration of these two personal milestones. 

First, let me recall briefly my observations of the seven great total/annular solar eclipses.  These are spectacular astronomical events, extremely rare in respect of any specific geographical location, but quite frequent when looked upon globally.  Statistically, the average wait period for such an event to recur at the same place is about 375 years!  Though globally such an event occurs approximately once in about 18 months, if one considers the fraction of populated land on the surface of the planet, the chance of this happening at conveniently accessible sites is very low.  As such, if one is seriously interested in observing such an event, one has to go where it happens rather than expect it to happen where one can go. Most people may not get such an opportunity even once during a lifetime!

Now, let me review my sightings of the solar eclipses beginning with my inaugural one, a spectacular total eclipse on 16 Feb 1980, which I saw at the Tungabhadra dam site in southcentral India. This was described in my very first blog article on eclipses (see here).  There was an inexcusably long wait for the next one, a total eclipse on 22 July 2009, viewed at a hilly location near Anji city, near Hangzhou in China.  This was the only one affected by clouds (see here for a detailed account), but rather insignificantly. My third one was an annular solar eclipse that I saw at Dhanushkodi near Rameshwaram in Tamilnadu on 15 Jan 2010.  It was very special because of the exceptionally long duration of the annularity, over ten minutes in fact, the longest this millennium!  See here for a blog article on this event. 

The viewing of my fourth eclipse, another spectacular total one, came on 9 Mar 2016, at the coastal city of Palu in Central Sulawesi province of Indonesia.  For my fifth, yet another total solar eclipse that I observed on 21 Aug 2017, I had to travel half way across the globe to Clarkesville, near Nashville, Tennessee, USA. Regrettably, I am yet to write about these two events in my blog.  I intend to make up for the lapse sometime soon, as indeed also for not writing about all but two of the manmade wonders of the world highlighted in this article.

Along with a fairly large group of associates and friends I was able to observe my sixth eclipse, an annular one on 26 Dec 2019, at Bekal beach on north coastal Kerala. Of all the eclipses I have viewed, this was the nearest to my home city of Mysore. Please see here for a lengthy blog article on it. My last and seventh one, the Great North American Eclipse, is the subject of a detailed article (see here) in my last blog earlier this month.    

Symbolism of 7

The number seven has many symbolic connotations and meanings in various pursuits of life, especially in occult ‘disciplines’ like numerology, spirituality, mythology, astrology, etc. It has a special place in psychology too. A cognitive principle of psychology, known as Miller’s law, states that the average person can only hold about 7 (plus or minus 2) items in their working memory at a time. This is apparently the basis for the magic number 7. There are also seven colors of the rainbow, seven planets, seven days of the week, seven continents, etc., and by way of arcane examples, seven chakras of Hinduism and Buddhism, seven sacraments, seven deadly sins in the Bible, etc. The number seven is featured extensively in most religions, and the Roman numeral system is comprised of seven letters. Perhaps not so well recognized is the fact that 7 is the largest single digit prime number.

It is therefore no wonder that this number got associated initially with (seven) ancient wonders of the world.

Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

The famous Greek historian Herodotus wrote of seven great architectural achievements of his times. Though his writings did not survive, he sowed the seeds for what has become the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

These seven ancient wonders are commonly believed to be:

            1. Colossus of Rhodes in Greece,
            2. Great Pyramids of Giza in Egypt*,
            3. Hanging Gardens of Babylon in modern Iraq,
            4. Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Greece,
            5. Temple of Artemis at Ephesus at modern Türkiye,
            6. Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, also in Türkiye, and
            7. Lighthouse of Alexandria in Egypt^.

            [ * I had the opportunity to see these during my ten-day trip to Egypt in April 2016 

                (see here for a detailed account.)
              ^ I had the opportunity to stand at the site of this, 

              also during my ten-day trip to Egypt in April 2016. ]

Of these, four were destroyed by earthquake, two by fire, and only one, the Pyramids of Giza in Egypt (the most ancient of them all – about 4500 years old), is still standing. These are caricatured below: 

Wonders Revisited

Though numerous lists of seven wonders of different categories have been compiled informally from time to time, a serious internationally pursued effort to identify a set of new seven (modern) wonders of the world was undertaken only relatively recently, in 2001, through the initiative of one Bernard Weber, a Canadian-Swiss.  This was organized by the New 7 Wonders Foundation (N7W) based in Zurich, Switzerland.

The final list of seven was decided through a popularity poll via free web-based voting, as well as telephone voting during the later stages of the poll process.  The poll ended up becoming the largest popular poll of its kind on record and was considered unscientific partly because it was possible for people to cast multiple votes, and partly because of strongly biased voting in favour of some of the finalists towards the closing stages.

The program drew a wide range of official reactions. Some countries supported their finalist and tried to get more votes cast for it, while others ignored or even criticized the contest. After supporting the New 7 Wonders Foundation at the beginning of the campaign by providing advice on nominee selection, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), bound by its bylaws to give equal status to all World Heritage Sites, distanced itself from the exercise.

The 21 landmark nominees that were considered in the final stage of the race to become the New 7 Wonders of the World are listed in alphabetical order below:

            1 Acropolis, Greece^
            2 Alhambra, Spain
            3 Angkor Wat, Cambodia^
            4 Chichén Itzá, Mexico*
            5 Christ the Redeemer, Brazil*
            6 Easter Island Statues, Chile
            7 Eifel Tower, France^
            8 Hagia Sophia, Türkiye^
            9 Kiomizu-Dera Temple, Japan^
            10 Machu Picchu, Peru*
            11 Neuschwanstein Castle, Germany
            12 Petra, Jordan*
            13 Pyramids of Giza, Egypt#^
            14 Roman Colosseum, Italy*
            15 Statue of Liberty, USA^
            16 Stonehenge, UK
            17 Sydney Opera House, Australia^
            18 Taj Mahal, India*
            19 The Great Wall, China*
            20 The Kremlin, Russia
            21 Timbuktu, Mali

            [* Voted as one of the New 7 Wonders of the World.
            ^ Also visited by this writer.
            # Considered too important to be grouped in the final list 

            – accorded an honorary status.]

My New 7 Wonders (in chronological order) 

Now, I get down to providing brief descriptions of each of the New 7 Wonders that I have been able to visit, in chronological order, starting with the Taj Mahal as far back as 1963, long before the idea had been conceived.

 1    The Taj Mahal 

Below are excerpts from my blog article (see here) on this amazing monument, from my own country, India: 

”The Taj Mahal has always been regarded as one of the great wonders of the world and hence its inclusion in the official list of “New Seven Wonders of the World” in 2007 was only a formality despite the fact that the selection was by popular voting.  I was one of the more than one hundred million voters, and I had placed this at the top of my list.” 

”When I first saw the Taj Mahal way back in 1963, I was dumbstruck by the sheer grandeur and beauty of the famed monument.  It made an impact on me far exceeding the expectations aroused from my gleanings of the architecture and history of the Mughal period in India.  What struck me most was the perfect proportion and symmetry between different parts of the monument, especially in relation to the huge central dome, as well as its surroundings.  Because of this, one doesn’t really perceive how gigantic it really is, something that shows up very conspicuously in two of my close-up pictures presented later.   I had read great descriptions and seen some breathtaking pictures of it, but these faded away in comparison with the sight of the real thing, a magnificent marble mausoleum built as a symbol of eternal love by an opulent and indulgent monarch.   Unfortunately, at that time, I was yet to get hooked on to photography as a hobby and have nothing to show for my experience.  The next time I went to see it many years later with a camera, the monument was enveloped at several places by some rather ugly scaffolding for major repairs and was not worth photographing.  At the third time I went to see it, my photographic interests had gone into hibernation.  My real opportunity for some serious photography came only relatively recently, in February 2005, when I visited Agra on a ‘guided’ tour from Delhi.”

“One enters the Taj through its main gate in a massive red brick building (see picture below) which is in itself a great sight. 

"Standing at the entrance gate, the sight of the great marble monument at the far end of two long pathways on either side of a waterway is a breathtaking experience. As one steps inside, the whole of the complex with its rich greenery and gardens comes alive."

“The following two photos from a close range indicate how gigantic and impressive the monument really is:” 

“At one place on the periphery of the quadrangle I saw the huge dome of the monument behind the beautifully bare branches of a tree and captured the combination, a creation of nature blending with one of man.  Here it is – one of my best photographs of the day.   It can be better appreciated when seen in full size (click to expand).”  

My repeated visits to the Taj Mahal were made possible by the fact that the city of Agra, where the monument is located, lies on the railway line between Bangalore and New Delhi, and I had to travel to Delhi frequently by train during the early years of my employment with the NCERT. I therefore carry unforgettable memories of the Taj with me. 

2    The Colosseum, Rome

The Roman Colosseum  is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre ever built, and is still the largest standing amphitheatre in the world, despite its age (AD 80). It could hold an estimated 50,000 to 80,000 spectators at various points in its history. it was used for gladiatorial contests and public spectacles including animal hunts, executions, re-enactments of famous battles, and dramas based on Roman mythology.

I visited the Colosseum in Aug 1967, on my way back to India from a 6-month stay in the USA, and then again in Sep 2017, during part of a three-week European trip. I must confess that, for me, this was the least exciting of the seven wonders, partly because it seeks to ‘celebrate’ a brutal sport indulged in by the Romans of the day and hasn’t much aesthetic quality about it. I found several architectural marvels even in Rome comparable to this, and saw no merit in this being singled out as a wonder of the world. 

3    The Great Wall of China, near Beijing 

The Great Wall of China is a magnificent series of fortifications that were built across the historical northern borders of ancient Chinese states and Imperial China as protection against various nomadic groups and other intruders. The best-known sections of the wall were built by the Ming dynasty (1368–1644). Apart from defence, other purposes of the Great Wall have included border controls, regulation of trade, and the control of immigration and emigration. The defensive characteristics of the Great Wall were enhanced by the construction of watchtowers, troop barracks, garrison stations, etc., at strategic points along the wall. In all, the wall is an incredible 21,000 km long! Large portions of it still exist in tact. Incidentally, it is not true that it is visible from any spacecraft in earth orbit.

I was unlucky to end up visiting one of the best preserved parts of the Great Wall, a short journey from Beijing, in heavily overcast and rainy weather on 16 July  2009, just  days before watching a great total solar eclipse (see here for a detailed account) elsewhere in the country.  Below is a decent picture of me on the gloomy day, with an American acquaintance seated next to me on a watch tower.

When the rain relented later in the day, I walked all the way up to the topmost fortification seen in the picture below, an arduous exercise befitting the memorable occasion.

4    Petra, Jordan

Petra is a historical and archaeological city in the harsh desert climate of southern Jordan. It is in a basin among the mountains that run from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba. Petra is believed to have been settled as early as 9,000 BC and became the capital city of the Nabataean Kingdom. The Nabataeans were nomadic Arabs who used Petra because it was near the spice trade routes. The Kingdom became a client state of the Roman Empire in the first century BC and lost its independence in 106 AD. Petra's importance declined as sea trade routes developed. Also, an earthquake in 363 AD destroyed many of its structures. The Byzantine Era led to the construction of several Christian churches and the continued decline of Petra. By the early Islamic era, only a handful of nomads lived in Petra. It stayed unknown to the world until it was rediscovered in 1812 by Johann Ludwig Burckhardt.

Described as "one of the most precious cultural properties of man's cultural heritage”, Petra has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1985. It is also Jordan's most-visited tourist attraction, with a hugely pricey entry fee.

Shown in the picture above is the main attraction of the Petra complex, the monolithic building Al Khazaneh (the Treasury), the first and best-known stop in a long journey inside the vast site, starting from an impressive entrance and winding through a very long narrow ravine topped on either side by tall spectacular cliffs.

Below is a picture of me in front of the Al Khazaneh which I had reached on a blazingly hot afternoon on 5 Oct 2018 after a long and tiresome walk through the ravine, so tiresome in fact that I gave up any thought of continuing on to other sites in the vast complex, and turned back. It was the final day of a gruelling ten-day combined trip to Israel and neighbouring Jordan. 

5    Machu Picchu, Peru 

Located at an altitude of about 2,500 meters in a place of great natural beauty, in the middle of a tropical mountain forest, the sanctuary of Machu Picchu was probably the most amazing architectural achievement of the Inca Empire at its peak. Its walls, terraces and gigantic ramps give the impression of having been sculpted into the rock escarpments, as if they were part of it. The natural setting, located on the eastern slope of the Andes, is part of the upper Amazon basin, which has a very varied flora and fauna. Most of the outlying buildings have been reconstructed in order to give visitors a better idea of how they originally appeared. By 1976, 30 percent of Machu Picchu had been restored and the restoration work still continues. The Incas built the establishment around 1450 AD but abandoned it a century later, at the time of the Spanish conquest. 

Though located only about 80 km from the ancient Peruvian city of Cusco, it is a daylong journey in the Peruvian Andes, first by train with spectacular views up to a point from where another segment of the journey is performed by smaller trams, and then by road right up to the base camp.  Thereafter, it is a steep but short climb to reach the heights of Machu Picchu for a wonderful panoramic view pictured above. Below is a picture of me at this picturesque location. This was followed by over two hours of walking through the various parts of the site, exploring the intricate web of buildings and other construction work. I went through this unforgettable experience on a glorious day on 23 Jan 2019 as part of a two-week long trip to South America, covering Argentina, Chile, Peru and Brazil in that order. The return journey was disrupted by a huge down pour. It was lucky that this did not happen on the outward journey.

Below is a view of the labyrinthine structures within the Mach Picchu complex: 

The visit to Machu Picchu left a lasting impression on me, next only to the Taj Mahal and the Great Wall of China, as a truly great wonder of the world, fully deserving the accolade. 

6    Statue of Christ the Redeemer, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 

Constructed between 1922 and 1931, Christ the Redeemer is an Art Deco statue of Jesus Christ in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, created by French-Polish sculptor Paul Landowski and built by Brazilian engineer Heitor da Silva Costa, in collaboration with French engineer Albert Caquot. The statue is 38 m tall, including its 8 m pedestal. The arms stretch 28 m wide. It is made of reinforced concrete and soapstone. The statue weighs 635 metric tons and is located at the spectacular peak of the 700 m Corcovado Mountain in the Tijuca National Park overlooking the city of Rio de Janeiro. This statue is the largest Art Deco-style sculpture in the world. A symbol of Christianity around the world, the statue has also become a cultural icon of both Rio de Janeiro and Brazil. Over the decades it has undergone extensive repairs, restoration and maintenance, mainly because of lightning strikes and wind erosion. 

I visited this monument on 28 Jan 2019, towards the end of a two-week trip to four South American countries, the last of them being Brazil, with Rio de Janeiro city being a major tourist attraction in Brazil. The approach to the statue was through a winding train journey up a mountain peak, providing spectacular views of the city as the train wound its way leisurely.  After the occupants had been dislodged, they were transported vertically up a short height by enormous elevators and deposited a few steps below the pedestal on which the statue was standing.  Here is a picture of me near the statue, surrounded by a (usually) huge crowd of tourists on a warm sunny afternoon: 

What makes the statue of Jesus the Redeemer attractive is the locale, not so much the statue by itself.  If one were to go by the appeal of statues, there are superior ones in other places, the Statue of Liberty in New York and the Eiffel Tower in Paris being two notable examples, both outvoted. What brought the Rio statue into the winners’ list is apparently a hugely biased and canvassed voting, as also the religious fervour that went with it. 

7    Chichén Itzá, Mexico 

Finally, I am in the exuberant mood of reporting my visit on the 10th of last month (April) to the great pyramid of Chichen Itza in Mexico, to complete a sweep of all seven wonders of the world – over a span of six decades!  It was a blazingly hot afternoon, with the Sun beating down mercilessly, and not much by way of a shelter close by.  Just the day before, I had travelled from Austin Tx, USA, after viewing the Great North American Solar Eclipse of 8th Apr in Waco, Tx. Incidentally, it was my seventh total/annular eclipse over a period of 44 years and I was heading to complete my seventh wonders of the world ‘conquest’ as well! Below is a picture of me standing in front of the monument, lending silent testimony to my fete:

Chichén Itzá was a large pre-Columbian city built by the Mayan civilization, with notable achievements in astronomy, that flourished approximately during 600-1200 AD. The archeological site is located in Tinúm Municipality of Yucatán State, Mexico, near the present-day buzzing resort city of Cancun. The site exhibits a multitude of architectural styles, reminiscent of those seen in central Mexico and elsewhere. The presence of central Mexican styles was once thought to have been representative of direct migration or even conquest from central Mexico, but most contemporary interpretations view the presence of these non-Maya styles more as the result of cultural diffusion. Chichén Itzá was one of the largest Mayan cities and it was likely to have been one of the mythical great cities, or Tollans, referred to in later Mesoamerican literature.  

Though it is quite impressive, I wonder if the truly gargantuan pyramids of Teotihuacan near Mexico City (see my picture below), which I visited just two days later, wouldn’t have been a better choice to represent Mexico!

Ranking the 7

The New 7 Wonders Foundation never announced the votes polled by the finalist candidates and the consequent ranking of the seven, thereby forestalling further controversy about the project. Speculations apart, there is no official ranking.

After completing the list of seven, I have been occasionally asked how I would myself rank them by whatever criteria I may draw up, and which of them would be numero uno.  I don’t have much difficulty doing this.  Here is my ranked list, but I desist from delving into the criteria:

            1. Taj Mahal
            2. Great Wall of China
            3. Machu Picchu
            4. Chichén Itzá
            5. Petra
            6. Christ the Redeemer
            7. Colosseum

My list of 7

If I were to be asked to make up my own list of seven manmade wonders, from among all the tourist attractions I have visited in my extensive travels, here is what I come up with (stepping outside the 21 finalists in respect of the last three), without going into my criteria for the choice:

            1. Taj Mahal, India
            2. The Great Wall, China
            3. Machu Picchu, Peru
            4. Angkor Wat, Siem Reap, Cambodia
            5. The Pyramids of Teotihuacan, Mexico
            6. The Forbidden City, Beijing, China
            7. The Ellora Caves, Maharashtra, India

[PS: As to the obvious question of where I would place the great Pyramids of Giza in Egypt, I would also like to keep them in an honorary status since I agree with the reasoning that they are the greatest manmade wonders of all time and too precious to fall into any sort of classification.]

Seven Natural Wonders

In passing, one may note that the following ‘official’ list of the 7 Natural Wonders of the World was compiled by CNN, the broadcasting network, in collaboration with the Seven Natural Wonders organization:

            1. Mount Everest, China (Tibetan) – Nepal
            2. Paricutin Volcano, Michoacan, Mexico
            3. The Grand Canyon, Arizona, USA*
            4. Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe-Zambia^
            5. The Harbor of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
            6. Great Barrier Reef, Queensland, Australia*
            7. Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis), Arctic Circle

            [ * Visited by this writer
            ^ Failed to visit under very distressing circumstances]

My 7 Natural Wonders

With the caveat that I rate natural wonders generally higher than manmade ones, here is my own list of 7 of them, limiting myself to only those that I have been able to visit so far:

            1. Great Barrier Reef, Queensland, Australia
            2. The Grand Canyon, Arizona, USA
            3. Iguazu Falls, Brazil - Argentina
            4. Niagara Falls, Canada - USA
            5. Yosemite National Park, California, USA
            6. Jog Falls, Karnataka, India
            7. Mount Fuji, Japan

Epilogue

However 'magical' it may be to numerologists and others, 7 is just another (attractive) number for me. I am not enamoured of it and my yearning for more magical moments lives on.  I don't consider that the time is ripe for me to halt my pursuits. I would like to continue to go after the great wonders of all types, especially the natural ones, including great total solar eclipses. I welcome anyone interested in joining me in my future adventures.

 

The Great North American Eclipse of 08Apr24

A tale of two sightings

 

“In rating natural wonders, on a scale of 1 to 10, a total eclipse of the Sun is a million.”

-         Fred Espenak

 

Progression of eclipse as captured with a small telescope at Mansfield, Ohio, USA

 

This is an account of the agony and the ecstasy associated with a successful chase of the Great North American total solar eclipse of 08 April 24 at two different locations in the USA by two Indian amateur astronomers who made their personal journeys from far off Mysore, India.

[For a detailed curtain raiser to this event, please see my last blog article here. For my other articles on total/annular solar eclipses, see 1, 2 ,3, 4 and 5.]

Anticipation

Ever since I saw the total solar eclipse of 21Aug17 at Clarkesville near Nashville, Tn, in the USA, the one to follow this year in the same country was on my radar constantly.  I started planning for it after watching a spectacular annular solar eclipse in my own country on 26Jan19 along with my longtime associate and amateur astronomer Mr Krishnamurthy Mudugodu (Murthy for short) and others at Bekal Beach on coastal Kerala. Though Murthy’s interest was equally aroused, he saw a firm opportunity for viewing the Great North American Eclipse only recently.

Our plans turned out to be intentionally divergent – mine to settle for a location in southern Texas, and his for a northeasterly location, in Ohio state.  After reviewing logistic and climatic factors, we settled on Waco, Texas, and Mansfield, Ohio respectively, hoping that both, or at least one of us, would end up lucky enough to view the much-anticipated event at a time of the year when weather and cloud coverage were rather highly unpredictable.

Expectation

Detailed interactive maps of this and other eclipses are readily available on several websites.  Particularly useful was this website where, apart from information in meticulous detail, the expected progression of the eclipse could also be simulated for any given location.  The predicted eclipse parameters for Waco, Tx and Mansfield, Ohio are shown in the maps below:

My choice of Waco was dictated partly by the fact that the duration of totality there was as much as 4 min, 13 sec.   Murthy settled for about a minute lower, but both durations are typically longer than can be expected for most total solar eclipses.   But the overriding consideration was the visibility of the totality phase of the eclipse; here we were both treading on uncertain grounds.  When it comes to weather, and particularly to cloud cover, luck plays a huge role. As it turned out, we were both equally lucky.

Preparation

Considering that I had to travel half way round the world from home, I laid aside all thoughts of carrying any of my telescopes and accessory equipment for a non-amateur style observation and recording of the event.  Instead, I settled for simple hand-held equipment, such as a pair of binoculars fitted with a solar filter for visual observation, and a 25x zoom Panasonic Lumix camera, also fitted with a similar filter for basic photography (see picture below). Even here, I opted for a light-weight 8x40 Cason binoculars instead of my preferred 7x50 Olympus binoculars, and desisted the temptation to carry a massive 125x Nikon Coolpix P1000 Camera.  

For a super-senior citizen on the wrong side of 85, and all alone on a month-long foreign trip that extended to Mexico and Canada as well, travelling light was a necessity.  Moreover, I had to be able to hold the equipment steady with both hands to watch an event unfolding rather rapidly at an uncomfortably high altitude on a hot afternoon. I therefore focused on merely watching the event with my eyes rather than recording it since there were plenty of others to do the latter, including Murthy.  Being merely a senior citizen, Murthy suffered less from such limitations, and had the additional advantage of travelling with his family, with the prospect of others joining him at the venue. He carried several items of equipment, including a small portable telescope. He had also improvised a number of useful attachments to enhance the visibility of the event. 

Weather Outlook

We started looking up weather predictions for eclipse day at the two locations at least a fortnight in advance; they were definitely not encouraging. About a week before, there were no significant changes. Three or four days before, the outlook turned distinctly hostile, with both rain and extensive cloud coverage forecast over Waco at least, about an hour on either side of totality, which was around 1:35 pm local time. For me, visions of a bygone experience in distant China way back in 22 July 2009 started taking shape (see here).  There was nothing I could do but mark time with increasing unease. Murthy’s experience couldn’t have been any less agonizing.  He was beset with even greater uncertainty since he was to decide on a location only just a few days ahead.

Journey

I reached Houston from Bangalore on 5th April and proceeded to Austin Tx two days later after touring the Johnson Space Center which had been heavily waterlogged during my last visit to the USA.  I then made it to Waco, Tx by bus on the eventful day.  I had settled for the open grounds adjacent to the McLane Football Stadium as the venue, where public viewing had been organized by the Baylor University authorities.  My travel itinerary was inflexible, and I had really no plan B if Waco had proved untenable. I had considered Hillsboro as an option, but gave up the idea when I found its weather pattern was not much different from Waco.

Based in Durham, North Carolina, Murthy started his long road journey with his family on 5th April, with halts at Blacksburg and Johnstown near Columbus on the way, joined by friends at both places. Before proceeding to the eventual venue at Mansfield, he had time for an elaborate rehearsal of the sequence of activities that were to unfold on the eventful day.  He also had ample time to soak in the beautiful unpolluted night sky and take delight in locating familiar objects, but at a higher latitude (40^o N) than he was accustomed to at home (12^o.5 N). His itinerary was somewhat flexible, with Springfield as an alternate venue.  He dropped the idea when he realized that the duration of totality there was almost a minute less, and the extra minute at Mansfield was, in his own words, ‘worth its weight in gold’. They reached the beautiful Kingwood Gardens in Mansfield early morning and began their long day’s activities amidst picturesque surroundings.

Weather

When I left Austin by an early morning bus for Waco on eclipse day, one look at the skies and my worst fears threatened to come true. It was as dark and overcast as I had seen anywhere for a long time.  The best that happened by the time I reached the bus station at Waco was a distinctly clear silver shading to the dark clouds.  Buoyed up by this discovery, I leisurely walked up for about an hour to the great big football stadium whose backyards were being thrown open for public viewing, at a price.  After a long wait due to bureaucratic delays, I finally entered the ‘reserved’ space around the stadium a part of which can be seen in the picture below around noontime when the sky had begun to undergo a remarkable transformation. 

As always when I am traveling, my daughter Asha kept tab of my exact whereabouts with live tracking on her mobile!  Below is a screenshot she sent me minutes after I had reached my location initially.

By this time, I was acutely aware that the location behind the stadium afforded no protection from the Sun and no elevated place to sit and watch the eclipse comfortably.  So, I moved out of the enclosure hurriedly and shifted to a place adjacent to the stadium which shielded me from the direct Sun to just the right extent without affecting my view. More importantly, there were a row of concrete blocks to sit on or lean against as and when needed.  Here is a picture of one of them, right next to a precious shade-giving tree (barely visible to the right), with the equipment resting on my folded overcoat. This turned out to be my savior for the day!

Murthy rang up from Mansfield with the cheerful news that the sky was decently clear there and he had begun to deploy his instruments. It looked like we might be able to see the eclipse after all, defying the agonizing expectations.  I checked the latest weather prediction for Waco, and found to my delight that the previous gloomy figures had been pushed forward by two hours – just the time needed to complete the totality phase unobstructed. It was as if the elements had conspired to favour me, yet again, for the seventh time in a row!

Partial phase

The 80-minute-long partial phase of the Great North American Eclipse had begun and my excitement began to grow with every bite of the mighty Sun the puny Moon had eaten away relentlessly.  Here is a sequence of this phase I captured with my Lumix camera, set at full 25x optical zoom and auto-focus:

For the most part of the partial phase, clouds were playing hide and seek with the Sun, without blotting it out altogether.

Murthy’s sequence of superior quality pictures taken with his small refractor telescope are displayed as a composite visual at the beginning of this article.

Totality at Waco!

As the Sun’s disk was being gobbled up by a rapidly advancing moon, there was a noticeable drop in both brightness and temperature of the surroundings, and this was a welcome relief too from the harsh Sun.

As beginning of totality (second contact) approached, everything around us started dimming, the temperature dropped noticeably and produced a soothing effect, the heightened excitement was palpable, and it gave way to indescribable amazement at the sight of a spectacular diamond ring in a flash, which disappeared almost instantaneously to reveal the fabled solar corona which is visible only on such an occasion. To my surprise the corona looked like a small symmetrical ring around the Sun, and indeed some viewers close to me remarked that it was the ring of fire.  Of course, it could not be, because we were watching a total eclipse, not an annular one that could also be seen in that part of the world on 23^rd October last year.  Perhaps it is no wonder that it appeared like a ring of fire because the now totally cloudless sky around the Sun could still be seen faintly.  It was far from the level of darkness normally expected.  I will not go into plausible reasons why this was so.  However, as a visual spectacle, it was a bit of a letdown. Consequently, the star field surrounding the Sun was barely visible, and I had a hard time identifying even the planets Venus and Jupiter. (Also, I could not identify the Bailey’s beads just before the diamond ring effect)

As planned, I refrained from trying out any photography during this 4+ minutes of precious time when one’s vision has to be firmly planted on the corona and its neighborhood.  As planned before, I started looking through my binoculars after removing the filter covering it.

Below is the only picture I took during totality, with my OnePlus Open smartphone, unedited. It does appear to be overexposed, but still the level of brightness around the Sun is surprisingly high. I have no cogent explanation for it at this time.

Below are two pictures, one showing my surroundings sometime during the totality phase and the other a short while after the end of totality. The level of brightness during totality is much higher than I expected:

To conclude the narrative of my observations at Waco, below is a picture of me holding my binoculars, with one side fitted with a solar filter and the other closed, and observing the Sun during a partial phase of the eclipse, well before onset of totality.  My camera is hanging down over my right shoulder.  I also had my OnePlus Open smartphone in my shirt pocket. This simple arrangement served me well. 

The Mansfield Report

I was in constant touch with Murthy before, during and after the event, which was his first experience with a total solar eclipse.  He went to the venue with meticulous preparation, took some fine pictures without compromising on the visual observations, and led a team of both enthusiasts and serious observers on an exciting mission. The picture below apparently shows all the members of his team at the lush green Kingwood Gardens in Mansfield, a far more picturesque place than the one I visited. 

The Mansfield, Ohio Group

Back Row (l to r): Meenakshi Krishnamurthy, Aishwarya Nair, Krishnamurthy Mudugodu, Harshavardhan Chaturvedi and Brian Henning

Front Row: Maithri Krishnamurthy and Shreyas S Bhat

Here is a picture of the Mansfield group deploying all their ware and getting down to business. This is when the staff employed at the garden center mistook them for an eclipse filming crew!

Below is a map of the exact location at which the group set up their day long vigil: 

Here is a picture of Murthy with some of his equipment: 

The picture below depicts the right way to observe any astronomical phenomenon, but viewing the solar eclipse on a hot afternoon may not have been a comfortable experience! 

Below is a summary of Murthy’s key observations conveyed to me both orally and in writing

·      The weather was better than in Waco even early in the morning, and kept improving as the day progressed.  Though there was a haze much of the time, the observations were not significantly affected.

·      One of the group’s pictures of the partial phase taken with a Celestron NexStar 8SE telescope shows three tight groups of sunspots (see picture below)

·      The 8SE telescope can itself be seen in the picture below with its proud owner: 

·      Murthy was able to see the diamond ring effect at third contact, but not at the second.  Here is a picture of it taken with a Sony Alpha A7III mirrorless camera with 7300 mm focal length lens system:

 

·      A careful look at the picture below reveals a row of Bailey’s beads just before the diamond ring effect. This picture was taken with the same camera as above. 

·      Here is a view of the solar corona captured near the midpoint of totality. A more asymmetric and spikier corona was expected since the eclipse is happening near the 11-year peak of solar activity. At this point in time, I have no idea why this was not realized. 

·      The video clip below, shot at Kingwood Gardens in Mansfield during totality, clearly shows darker surroundings* all around than the ones I saw in Waco. This explains why Murthy could see both Venus and Jupiter, and I missed them. Unfortunately, he seems to have missed out on trying to capture the view/s with his smartphone amidst all the excitement. So did I!

[*Murthy describes the darkness he saw as similar to the one after sunset.]

 

Murthy’s final summation:

It was wonderful to experience the gradual decrease in brightness and temperature of the surrounding environment as the totality approached and progressed. There was an eerie silence which immediately turned into a collective gasp of exuberance as the totality began. At this moment we opened all the solar filter caps to capture the totally eclipsed sun on camera. We also took a step back to soak in the moment and directly see the eclipsed sun. Experiencing the spectacular beauty of the total solar eclipse live is something that is hard to express in words.

In the meantime, during the partial eclipse stage a few curious onlookers approached us to see what we were doing, and were enthralled to see the eclipsed sun through various different lenses. The solar filter-capped binoculars were a definite crowd favorite!

In conclusion, it was certainly a memorable experience of a phenomenon of nature which rarely repeats in a particular place. We were one of the early arrivers and the last to leave. We were lucky to have clear sky in spite of partly cloudy weather forecast.

Appendix

[ I had sent the following note to the prospective followers of my blog on the day after I viewed the eclipse]         

Here is some news about the great North American Total Solar Eclipse of yesterday (8Apr24) that I observed successfully from Waco, Texas. It was the seventh time in a row that luck favored me with total/annular solar eclipses. In this context, my last blog article may be relevant. The next article will describe how Krishnamurthy and I were able to explore the event of yesterday from two very different locations in the USA.  At Waco, the sky was totally overcast and made it virtually hopeless for a visible event, but the weather made a miraculous turnaround as the day progressed. The partial phase could be seen playing hide and seek with the clouds, but as totality approached, there were no clouds anywhere near the Sun! I would like to flatter myself that it happened because of my presence at Waco!? Please do look forward to my next blog article, about this event, after my present long trip abroad.

Fast Forward

While Murthy and I are both basking in the glory of the Great North American Eclipse of last month, my sight is fleetingly set on Valencia, Spain for the next total solar eclipse that will last barely a minute, on 12^th August 2026! But, the one to follow a year later on 02 Aug 27 at Luxor, Egypt, lasting a whopping 6 min, 23 sec, would be, to borrow a description from Murthy and twist it appropriately, ‘worth its wait (wait, this is not a spelling mistake!) in gold!’ I hope he and others, especially our mutual friend Ilavenil, who was denied the opportunity to see both the last two great American eclipses, can join me in these adventures.     

Tailpiece

Just two days after I saw the eclipse at Waco, I had the immense satisfaction of visiting Chichen Itza, a complex of fabulous Mayan relics near Cancun in Mexico, rated one of the seven wonders of the world.  This also meant that I had seen all the seven wonders, adding to my collection of seven total/annular solar eclipses spanning equally diverse locations on the globe.  My next blog article will address this aspect of my adventures, so appropriately suggested by one of my acquaintances.