Finally, it was August 21. I was excited about this eclipse for months. I chose the viewing location carefully. I wanted to be away from the crowd, somewhere in the wilderness. This morning we woke up in the middle of the forest, and the most importantly, inside the predicted path of Moon’s shadow. We did not have to go anywhere; we were right here and ready to observe the Moon to cover the Sun.

Since the morning, the sky was blue with a few clouds speckled around. We had a lot of free time; we observed insects, spiders and dragonflies. The weather forecast was not optimistic; predicted was the overcast sky with periods of rain. In the early afternoon, we heard sounds of the approaching thunderstorm. It was more and more likely that clouds would obscure the Sun and that would be the end of our viewing of the eclipse.

The partial eclipse began when Moon cut out the first bite from the Sun’s disk. It was about one hour and half before totality phase. Fascinating was the time of viewing, when the Sun became increasingly obscured. When our nearest star was visible only as a thin curved line, the sky had lost its brightness. We realized that everything became gray around us. Trees took on a strange, silver glow. It was like a deep twilight, but with unusual short shadows.

When the yellow section of the Sun disappeared, as predicted, but unexpectedly for us, the eclipse entered the most beautiful phase. With the naked eye, we could see the white aura of plasma surrounding the black Moon. The diamond ring was decorated with red beads on the edges. These were amazing moments. The totality phase we witnessed lasted for 2 min 31 sec.

Almost exactly when the eclipse totality ended, dense clouds covered the Sun completely. The whole sky became boring white. In the location we were standing, we could no longer watch the reverse partial eclipse, when piece-by-piece Moon was revealing the Sun's disc. It did not worry us much. We were happy with what we saw and experienced for the first time in our lives. These were unforgettable moments. I have never felt to be so close to the Sun, I truly realized that I am a part of the universe myself.

It was time for us to go. When we reached the main highway, we were reminded that this part of the American continent is densely populated and many of people living here wanted to see eclipse too. With slow traffic and jammed roads, we needed whole the night of almost uninterrupted driving to reach our home.