Partial Solar Eclipse

August 12th 2026 was a special date in the diary for any keen European sky-watchers, with a rare opportunity to catch a solar eclipse, with the moon passing in front of the sun.

A solar filter over my long lens meant I could capture the sun slowly disappearing, along with a few sunspots on the surface of the sun.

Totality passed over Greenland and Western Iceland, before sweeping down and across Northern Spain just before sunset. After much umm-ing and ah-ing about where to head to, we decided that the chance of cloud, either overhead in Iceland or on the horizon is Spain, just couldn’t justify the crazy prices for flights and accommodation.

In the end we decided that the best place to see this one was from the comfort of our back garden, where we’d see around 91% of the sun covered by the moon.

As more of the sun was covered by the moon the light began to fade and the birds began to sing, thinking it was the end of another day.

Maximum coverage from South Staffordshire in the UK. A real ‘wow’ moment.

Towards the end of the eclipse the sun was nearing the horizon and took on an orange, then red, hue.

A montage of photos, taken over around two hours.

I’ve read that the difference between witnessing a partial eclipse and a total eclipse is like the difference between being nearly dead and actually dead - sounds similar but is actually very, very different!

It was a really special moment, but one that left me with an even greater desire to see and experience totality at some point when there’s another solar eclipse.

In fact there’s another one next August, this time passing over the very south of Spain, so all I can say is watch this space…