I remeber this vividly - I was at the hospital with my mum as she was having surgery on her nose and I remember me, my mum, gran and sister going to the balcony - the entire city just stopped and watched. I'd love to see it again. 

I seem to remember most of the country being cloudy and not really seeing much of it.

I may have posted this tale before, but this was the first of the three total eclipses I've seen. One of my sister's friends at university was Hungarian and her family had a vineyard near Lake Balaton, which just happened to be in the path of totality. So I blagged a trip with my sister and her boyfriend as they drove across Europe to Hungary, where we camped between the vines.

I remember there was a tremendous thunderstorm the night before the eclipse, but in the morning skies were clear and we had a fantastic view. For the eclipse itself we walked up to the top of a hill where there's a ruined castle overlooking the lake:

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On top of the hill waiting for totality...

And the moment itself (not the greatest photo, but you get the impression)

I caught the bug so much that I made plans to travel to the next two eclipses: 2001 in Zambia and 2002 in South Australia.

If you get the chance, try to see one at least once in your life - there's nothing like it. And I do mean totality. A 99% eclipse isn'ty 99% as good as a 100% eclipse, it's maybe 1% as good! Seeing a black hole where the sun ought to be is the most awe-inspiring sight in nature IMHO.

There is a total eclipse this year, on November 13, but the only populated place to see it is in northern Queensland (where it will be the morning of November 14). Closer to home, there's one on March 20 2015 which will be visible from the Faroe Islands and Svalbard. Perhaps an easier opportunity will be on Aug 21 2017 when the path neatly bisects the continental USA: http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa...lot2001/SE2017Aug21T.GIF and there should be a decent chance of clear summer skies.

Caught the eclipse near Cherbourg as we were on holiday in NW France and made a beeline for a spot where we could get totality. Despite a lot of cloud it  was awesome, especially when the "wall of darkness" could be seen heading across the bay as it reached totality. The vast crowds of people fell strangely silent for the minute or so it went dark. You could see the lightness out at sea though and then we had a "wall of light" as totality ended. What a great day that was.  It makes the hairs on my neck stand on end when I think about it