By Doug Bickley
I arranged this event, our fourth at Halfpenny Green (now called Halfpenny Green Wine Estate), through their admin assistant Lisa Perks and the estate owner Clive. As usual they were really helpful and let us set up by the picnic tables next to the café. I put some flyers inside and talked to the staff and visitors as we were setting up. The last eclipse event here had been in June 2021, but this time there were only a few of us because the dates clashed with the spring WOW event.
The weather forecast was mixed, but as per usual completely wrong, because we were blessed with clear blue skies for the whole morning. We set up and had a variety of equipment, aiming to tell and show the public how to view the Sun safely. I had purchased some Eclipse Glasses from First Light Optics and we gave these away free to the public, but we also had a donation box which raised enough money to cover the cost.
I had two smart telescopes tracking and showing live views of the Sun on tablets plus a pair of binoculars on a tripod with a pan-tilt head and twin Baader filters. Trevor Clifton had a Skywatcher Startravel 120 with a Baader 10nm continuum filter which gave everyone fantastically clear views. Linda Manas brought along her Sunspotter wooden solar telescope projecting the Sun onto white paper, always a crowd-puller. John Smith brought a PST which proved difficult to set up. We also had a few DSLR’s and smartphones – and if you think you can’t take an eclipse shot on one of those have a look at the one taken by Emma Gobourn’s son Daniel.
First contact was 10:05 GMT and the maximum eclipse of around 40% was at 11:03 GMT. The eclipse ended at 12:01 GMT. During this time we had quite a few members of the public looking at the various instruments and asking questions. All in all a very enjoyable morning.
After the event several members stayed behind to visit the vineyard delicatessen and shop. Once again, our thanks to the staff at Halfpenny Green who were helpful and friendly as ever.