There was a full lunar eclipse tonight, and it was really cool. It was the first one my girls have seen, and we lay on their bedroom floor in the dark and looked out through the skylight with binoculars. They thought it was REALLY cool, and I’m happy to have instilled happy Daddy memories associated with Space in my girls.
My favorite eclipse happened in the late 80’s though, at Camp Barakel. It was late August, and I was working at Camp, and so my evenings were pretty free. I knew the eclipse was coming, and at about 11pm I said to my roommates, “Hey, there’s an eclipse happening right now, you guys want to go down to the lake and see it?” They were all for it, so away we went.
Barakel has a lake in the middle of the property, and they run camps on both sides. We were on West Side, for those in the know, and so we were facing east, with the moon about 35 degrees off the horizon. If you hold your hand at arms length, and turn it sideways, the moon was about the width of your hand above the trees.
The moon was about half covered when we got there, and it was looking pretty cool. As it got more and more covered, it got more and more red. Soon the entire moon was a deep blood red. We were actually standing on a deck, about 20 feet above the shoreline, so we had a good view of the lake. And the entire lake was a deep blood red also. It was pretty eerie.
Those of you who are real astronomy buffs know that August is the time for the Perseid meteor shower. As we stood there looking at the blood red moon, a shooting star lit up the entire sky, going from one of the lake to the other, almost horizon to horizon, right above the moon.
It was awesome in every sense of the word. We stood there speechless. Then one of the guys who was really into End Times stuff said
The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red, and the stars in the sky fell to earth, as late figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind.
That’s from Revelation 6:12-14. We said “Dude, knock it off” and went to bed. I’ll always remember that night though.
Wow, the lake sounds awesome. 🙂
My oldest daughter is becoming quite the astronomy nut. She can easily identify more constellations than her father. Which pleases, if not embarrasses me. She had 2 friends over for the night, and they all gawked at the moon. It was pretty neat to see them enjoy it.