Alas, to Austria we drove.

Little by little the Sun somewhat came out of the clouds, but not enough. There were no big enough openings in the clouds to make sure we'd see the full eclipse. We still had a couple of hours on us, so we went for the German border and more clear skys. We crossed the border and continued on the small roads towards Munich. There were already cars parked by the roads, and the most eager people had alrady prepared their camera gear. About this time the traffic reports began to tell about massive traffic jams on all nearby autobahns.

The weather began to look quite promising, when we noticed a huge and thick cloud front that was heading for us streight from the West. We made a quick U-turn and fled back towards Austria. Our only hope was a relatively large clear area before the pouring rain clouds. So, Emma decided to lead us East, outrunning the cloud front and finding the relatively big clear-looking area ahead of the rain. She was trying at the same time to read the map and the weather, while I concentrated on keeping on the road breaking every speed limit and shouting at each crossing: "To the left or to the right? Left or right?!!" At this time, the partial eclipse had already begun and admittedly my hopes for our trip's success sank all the time.

So, over the now practically non-existing German-Austrian border we went once more and found ourselves in Freilassing, a little town slightly to the north of Salzburg, and in the heart of the total eclipse area.

However, the combination of Coca Cola, caffeine pills and sheer excitement made us jumpy as hell. So, nervously we tuned the cameras, ate Hungarian wurst, drank soft juice, took a picture, ate, drank, took a picture, ate, drank, and so on; all this, while Eläkeläiset played their humppa on the background. Slowly, some workers of the wholesale emerged, some with mylar glasses and some without. To those without protection - like the Czechian truck driver who just happened to come to the right place at the right time to load his truck with candy and coffee filters - we gave our four spare welder's glasses.

This phase (including the disappearing clouds) is documented by the photograph series below. The photos are somewhat over-exposed, which blurs the lines of the sun.

The neighbourhood cheered as the day turned to a darkness that was only little brighter than a full Moon night. The sight was totally unreal and breathtaking, it was weirder than we could ever have imagined. Around the now black sun there were magical white beams to every direction, and the sky was a beautiful, dark blue. It didn't look real, it was like computer graphics! Even with no protuberances showing (I didn't dare to turn our unprotected binoculars towards the sun) the sight was astonishing.

What we saw was unlike anything we'd seen beforehand. The corona was not like it's in pictures. It wasn't yellow, nor orange nor red, it was white. And the sky was not black. As this sight has never been properly documented on film or video, I took the liberty of later reproducing what we saw on my computer. The picture to the right is programmed by me from my recollection combined with actual NASA APoD photos. Left to the Sun and somewhat lower Venus could be seen, and to the right there was a somewhat less bright object that might have been Mercury.

Then, after an eternity of darkness, the shiny pearls showed themselves for just a few seconds, and then it was over. It took all my will power not to still look at the sun just to get one final glimpse of the black moon. However, I do care about my eyes, so I let it go. Although we were tired, our mood was right up the dark sky as we hugged each others.

After the Dark Sun the partial eclipse that took an hour felt simply indifferent, so we started our journey back to the North. Now we only had to get through the traffic jams exceeding 40 km in every direction, especially towards Munich, all this while fighting overwhelming sleepiness. But that didn't really matter. We had won!

I had really thought I'd seen it all after witnessing a total eclipse through clouds in Finland in July 1990. How wrong I had been. Nobody had prepared me for this, not even the pictures that really can't grasp the contrast and dynamic range of the Grand Light Show.

• Finnish Astronomy Society URSA's Official Page
• Tero Rissa has some excellent pictures of the total eclipse on his Finnish page Auringonpimennys Bulgariassa.

Foreword

Tuesday the 3^rd of August, 1999

Wednesday the 4^th

The towns were very nice-looking, though. All houses seemed to be in good shape and they were rich with ornaments, very much unlike Finland.

In the evening we arrived in Leipzig where we spent our first night in a friendly youth hostel.

Thursday the 5^th

In Munich we tried again to get to a youth hostel, but even if they did have free rooms, they were not going to let us in: I am over 27, and that was an absolute limit for them. When I asked why, they just said that now we are in a different country with different rules. I must admit being quite surprised that bureaucracy is much more alive and well in former Western Germany compared to the former Eastern Germany. Perhaps now that former BRD is combined to former DDR the Eastern Germans will teach their Western cousins out of that bad habit?

However, at the youth hostel they were able to recommend us an inexpensive bierstube very close to the hostel. So, there we went and found us a simple, yet nice room, that had warm water every now and then.

We spent our early evening watching Munich and visiting a furniture store, where we bought some lamps. We also saw a big opening where they were already building bierstubes, presumably for Octoberfest. Later we dined at the outdoor restaurant of our own bierstube and got our first taste of kartoffelknödels, sauerkraut, and of course beer, which I must admit as someone who doesn't particularly like beer, was good. We also petted the huge bierstube dog, Sissi.

Friday the 6^th

The museum closed before we had had time to fully explore it (it would take a couple of days, at minimum), so we went back to our bierstube and tested the lamps we'd bought the day before, and had another extra-heavy meal.

Saturday the 7^th

So, to the alps we went. When the mountains showed themselves through the clouds for the first time, they looked quite unreal: as I've not been to the mountains of Finnish Lapland, I've never seen shapes like that. For a short while we wondered if it was such a great idea after all to try to drive the highest road.

However, we continued towards road 107, which is a pay-road and only open in the summertime, for reasons that became quite clear: 30 km of 10% uphill, the top at 2508 m, and then another 30 km of 10% downhill is enough to take several hours and teach new driving habits. Of course, after driving the road you can proudly put on your car the "I've visited Hochtor" sticker that they gave at the road tax station.

It was not before dark that we came to Lake Wöhler See, and spent our first camping night. One cultural difference: even if it was quite warm, the sky felt like September. It became too dark and too soon. Even in the Southern parts of Finland the sky doesn't go completely black before September.

Sunday the 8^th

Monday the 9^th

The castle was pack-filled with tourists, and moving around was next to impossible. The other of our listening devices didn't work properly and when I tried to complain about it, the personnel was totally indifferent. And, after the magnifient Austrian alps, the castle just felt small. And hot. And crowded. I hated it. The gardens were somewhat nicer, but still I felt relieved when we continued our trip East.

The Hungarian border took only five minutes to cross, so we continued on a pay-highway to Györ. The pay-highway is a chapter in itself. It's been built since communism failed, but the road tax is so high that only western tourists can afford to drive it. So, there we were, along with just a few cars, driving on a four-lane highway. After all the traffic everywhere it was like being in heaven.

However, after Györ we continued to the South to reach the Northern-Eastern parts of Lake Balaton. Now the roads were quite crowded again, with only one thin lane per direction. So, passing even a tractor was quite a feat and there were long queues forming most of the time. This country could use some autobahns.

At one point we stopped at an ice-cream kiosk, and the friendly lady there, who was quite fluent in English, told us that we are the first Finnish tourists she'd ever seen. She gave us a map and recommended that we drive to the Western Northern parts of Balaton. And so we did.

Driving alongside Balaton when it is over 30°C warm is not something that is easy. The greyish green water just calls you to swim. However, finally we stopped to a camping lot at (fill-in-later). And to the water we went!

In the evening we bought a whole 4 kg water melon, and ate it with two bottles of beer. When we watched the stars later, some German youngsters thought our mosquito smokes were some kind of dope and one of them asked me for a smoke. I still kick myself in the head for not selling a mosquito smoke spiral for 20 DM to him :-) .

Tuesday the 10^th

We swam at a beach eating local kiosk delicacies like deep fried cauliflower, until 3 PM when I thought Emma (in photo above) was fried well enough on both sides. Then we continued back to Austria because we'd got the erraneous weather mobile phone reports mentioned in the Eclipse story.

When we left Balaton, we saw an incredible vehicle (photo): a Trabant (the only European car that's partially made of wood) that was painted in dark metallic green (instead of the matte grey color that was the standard "colour" in so many communism era cars) and that had orange spoke wheels. That was a real sight!

Wednesday the 11^th

After the eclipse we had great trouble in getting to the North. Even if we chose to leave the autobahns alone, we were able only to drive 230 km in 8 hours, reaching Regensburg at the end of the day. And the cars coming towards us were going slower! We nighted at an Etap Motel, which could be described as the McDonalds of motels: it doesn't taste particularly good, but you get your stomach filled. Likewise, you could sleep in this, and there was a shower and a TV set (the only one on our trip), and it was clean. So, if you want just to sleep, I'd recommind en Etap Motel.

We watched other eclipse reports on the telly, and they confirmed what we'd thought: most of Western Europe missed it.

Good night.

Thursday the 12^th

At 9 pm we were finally at Puttgarten, where we helped a Danish man with his daughter by towing their car on the Danish ferry. Then we towed them to the nearest open car repair station. After 11 pm we tried to find a place to sleep. The only open hotel would have cost three times as much as the earlier lodging places we'd been in, so we refused, in the hopes that there would be open motels later on our journey. There weren't.

Denmark is a weird country. They actually close the whole f... country at ten or so. It was absolutely impossible for us to find any open motel, so finally, after driving 900 km, we erected our tent at a parking lot beside one of the highways at approximately 1 am.

Friday the 13^th

After the hectic traffic in Middle-Europe, rriving the four lane highways in Sweden felt just too safe: everyone driving with approximately the same speed (the highest speed limit a meager 110 km/h), much less traffic than in the other countries, and the road was in great condition. We nighted in Akalla, which is in Northern Stockholm at Emma's father's, who lives there. The day trip, 600 km, felt all too easy.

Saturday the 14^th

Sunday the 15^th

However, after almost two weeks, we got to sleep at home; home sweet home.

Closing words

• Ice-cream. Europe has tons of good ice-cream. In Finland all brands have vanilla, strawberry, chocolate and perhaps one or two similarly boring kinds of ice-creams, but these were totally different, and with enough of fat and taste. Our favourites were Mövenpick's Tequila Sunrise and Blood Orange.
• Yoghurts. Real yoghurts with 10% of fat instead of the fatless, tasteless youcky-yucks available here.
• Traffic. Too much of it. All too much.
• Currency. Deutsch Marks were usable both in Austria and in Hungary, with very few exceptions, like a Hungarian post office. If and when Euro comes it will be really easy to buy things abroad.
• Credit cards 1. In Finland shops are required to check your ID if you buy with a credit card for at least 50€. In Germany, Austria and Hungary no-one checked my ID when I was paying with my VISA, not even in the furniture store where we spent some 200€. This was actually quite scary: it is all too easy to steal a card number and buy with a faked card. The other extreme was of course Sweden, where I had to show my ID when I bought a clock for 15€.
• Credit cards 2. As might have been expected, paying with credit card was not very commonly supported in Hungary. But, as said earlier, Deutsch Mark was good currency most of the time, so there was little need for local Forints.
• Credit cards 3. In Finland you have been able for years to buy gas with your credit card from automated stations. This concept seems to be unknown in any other countries, including Sweden.
• Language. The travel books told us that the Hungarian youth is quickly learning English now after the communism crumbled. To our experience this is not true. The only spoken languages there seemed to be Hungarian and German.
• Traffic lights. In Finland the red-green cycle of the traffic lights is much faster compared to Germany and Austria.