One Author Found Solace in Chasing the Total Solar Eclipse in Chile Following the Events of 2020

The weather prediction was as gloomy as it could be. Rain on December 12th. On December 13, it rained. I had driven 5,500 kilometers to witness the solar eclipse on December 14th, and there was more rain that day. In the midst of the pandemic, on the 11th, I had sat masked on a nerve-wracking aircraft from New York to Santiago and then to Temuco in southern Chile. Even though I had noted the gloomy forecast before boarding, I had become numb to it after nine months of house bondage. The concept of ideal circumstances or an ideal experience had long since been removed from consideration. 

A cosmic and spiritual reset has been associated with eclipses for a long time. From Scandinavian and Asian folklore to American folklore, these occurrences are portrayed as a struggle between the forces of light and dark, with the moon, along with other wicked characters like as wolves, bears, frogs, or dragons, attempting to topple the day-night hierarchy. Soothsayers and medicine men would often read the terrifying inversion of time, space, and temperature as a warning, even though the forces of light ultimately prevail: Listen up. Be grateful for every moment. 

However, my goals for the journey were not particularly lofty. I wanted to see how much I had lost due to lockdown as the year came to a close. My regular stream of impulses for understanding the world and my place in it had been interrupted, if not destroyed, by the pandemic. How severely were my senses impaired? Had the ordeal ruined my ability to be amazed? 

My driver was concerned about the weather the whole two hours we were in transit from the airport to our eclipse-specific glampsite in the southern Chilean Lake District, where we passed dairy and berry farms through his rain-splattered window. According to him, temperatures have been around 20 degrees lower than usual, with lows in the 40s at night. Lake Villarrica, a favorite spot for sightseers, was almost in our sights. Nobody was out on the water, not even swimmers, as the rain turned the lake's surface like a salt-and-pepper stipple. High season was a bust.

In the Andean foothills, we arrived at Pucón, a popular destination for outdoor enthusiasts. Here, you can go skiing, trekking, bicycling, or fishing. Smallholdings, rustic huts made of wood, and rural residences covered in corrugated tin replaced the monotony of industrial farms. Looking distant, we could make out two snow-capped volcanoes, Rucapillán and Lanín. In a landscape characterized by rolling hills and valleys blanketed in mist, herds of sheep—both white and brown—grazed in perfect unison, all eyes fixed on the path ahead. 

I was surprised when the vehicle came to a stop at our destination. In the midst of my anxious trip planning (facial shield or goggles? I hadn't really considered the lodgings (would you like one mask or two?). The very mention of "camping" had suggested a simplistic, understated arrangement. However, this location on the banks of the Río Liucura, which is ideal for fly fishermen and is now overflowing due to the recent rainfall, felt more like a village. 

In related news, three eclipses will be visible in North America over the next five years. 

Raul Buenaventura, CEO and creator of VM Elite, an adventure broker that serves affluent clientele interested in visiting Patagonia, the Atacama Desert, and remote regions of Bolivia and Peru, built the camp. About fifty yards apart are a dozen or more enormous, circular tents that make it up. The characteristic chorus of black-throated huet-huet birds could be heard from the forests surrounding the campground. Epiphytes, moss, and lichen coated the trees; some had fronds the thickness of spaghetti. A combination of the humid cold, the aroma of pine, and the fragrant smoke from wood fires wafted our way. 

Buenaventura has successfully set up a camp for an eclipse in July 2019, some 650 miles north of Pucón, close to La Serena, and eclipse-spotting is becoming increasingly popular. In the two weeks leading up to my trip, I messaged him feverishly as the weather and COVID-19 conditions changed seemingly every hour. He appeared to be completely helpless, which was understandable. 

Totality of the eclipse would be seen only inside a 56-mile zone spanning Chile and Argentina; outside that range, visibility would fade into the South Atlantic. The planning of an unprecedented eclipse watching event appeared daunting in light of the rain, the necessity of social distance, and travel limitations that varied from one town, province, and country to another. When we met in person, Buenaventura, a young man in his forties dressed in preppy-chic trekking gear, seemed excited, if a little sleep-deprived. 

"After all the closures this year, I really had no expectations," he commented. The ability to witness the eclipse and share that experience with others was my primary goal. It seemed obvious to me that it would be challenging. 

As Buenaventura showed me around, he told me that the tents could hold electrical circuitry, which was a huge plus. They were manufactured by a British company called Bell. "You can get heaters in there, AC, bathrooms, whatever you need." When we got to my tent, the only things I could feel were the warmth and the bed, which looked so soft. Everything else was irrelevant at that instant. I met the other twenty-five or so guests who had defied the weather, travel restrictions, and improbable odds of actually witnessing the eclipse at mealtimes over the next two days. We dined on freshly made breads and hefty platters of lamb and beef while gazing out over the river from a deck that had been prepared by a professional chef. What the eclipse meant to the other campers and why they had come was something I found out. 

A 30-year-old Santiagoan guy shared that he'd heard that, during eclipses, trees cast curved shadows, fish halt swimming, and flower petals close. Another individual elaborated on the idea that the sun is essentially God since it is the origin of all life. For this reason, humans can only see God's face clearly during a total eclipse.

In my mind, the event might have meant something different. In 1979, when I was fourteen years old and heavily intoxicated, I witnessed an eclipse in the parking lot of a Minot, North Dakota, shopping mall. I was invited to join a group of amateur scientists on an excursion by my oldest buddy David and his father, who were going to the Science Museum of Minnesota. After a night on the road in a rented bus, we finally made it around dawn. We sat on a desolate patch of asphalt, munching on sandwiches while we watched the scientists unload an unbelievable amount of equipment, including cameras, spectrometers, and telescopes. 

Around the middle of the morning, the wind died down. Birdsong ceased. Like a steamroller, darkness rolled over us. As purple-tinged shadow bands strobbed across the plain, the familiar firmaments of earth, sky, and sun ceased to radiate heat to the flesh. We stared in awe for a whole two minutes and forty-nine seconds—a sufficient duration, we soon realized, to be absorbed in the boundless. 

My friend's dad, Dale, was a former college football standout, and he gave us some advise on the bus ride home. Throughout the eclipse, the amateur scientists had squinted through their instruments, taking measurements and making notes, completely oblivious to the natural phenomena that had drawn their attention. It was the 1970s, so we stood out even more because no one else was watching with their eyes closed. "I think it's good sometimes," remarked Dale, "to just take things in instead of trying to capture and preserve them." 

The advice he gave me all those years ago—"Learn to resist the perpetual urge to interpret and analyze, to manufacture opinion and create meaning"—had been circulating in my head. Naturally, one must learn to live in the now. Also, get good at watching. 

From his early years, Buenaventura had made annual pilgrimages to the Lake District for activities such as whitewater rafting, motorcycling, and trekking. Every path and river bend appeared to be familiar to him. Nicholas, his younger brother, took me to see Irma Epulef, a longtime friend of theirs and a machi (traditional healer) from the Mapuche Indigenous community, the day before the eclipse. "I think she'll have an interesting perspective on the eclipse," he commented. 

Curarrehue is a small town about 10 miles from the Argentina border; we traveled there for about an hour. As we stepped off the roadway, we saw Epulef standing beside her ruka, a traditional sweat lodge with mud walls and a tall, conical wooden roof. She was dressed in a ceremonial poncho. Upon her invitation, we went inside and took our seats on the benches that lined the walls. In the middle of the dirt floor, a woodstove smouldered. 

Epulef got down to business. "When I was young," according to her, "children and pregnant women were prohibited from viewing eclipses." Many felt the struggle between good and evil to be excessively brutal. Our conversation revolved around the definitions of light and darkness. "Darkness is when we can't advance in anything," according to her. "Like this whole last year." 

The year 2020 was a nightmare for everyone, but for Chileans, it was downright terrifying. Along with the epidemic, this year continued the political turmoil of 2019, with demonstrations (both peaceful and violent) taking place around the country and instances of police brutality garnering international attention. 

Symbolizing the four elements—earth, wind, fire, and water—Epulef took up a hand-carved drum. According to her, Mother Earth, or ñuki mapo, becomes angry when the elements become unbalanced. The world has been pushed too far by humans. We have betrayed Mother Earth. We have betrayed the land. She shrugged her shoulders, remarking that the quila, a local bamboo species, hadn't blossomed the year before. "For us, these natural events are like news announcements." 

While we alternated in feeding the flames, Epulef informed us that the Mapuche people would be praying fervently during the next few days. Because a change is necessary, we pray that people might understand the importance of humility. We can only hope that this eclipse leads us back to a more optimistic path. 

By the time our visit came to a close, the clouds parted, and the sunbeams illuminated the verdant landscape as we made our way back to camp. But the rain came again the following night and didn't stop until the morning of the eclipse, pounding on my canvas roof the whole time. Outside my tent flap, I found puddles when I woke up. There was relative silence at the breakfast table. Anxieties, optimism, and courage had washed over us. However, we largely felt ridiculous in the cold and rain at this moment. 

Half an hour prior to the eclipse, Buenaventura summoned all campers to congregate on the terrace outside the kitchen for a group discussion regarding our purpose for being here. We had to shout to be heard above the deafening downpour that pounded the rubberized sheet that covered us. 

During our time together, one man shared, "I am someone whose life is always planning and structured. Everything is cut into small squares, or cuadradito. "I wanted to let go of my thinking, my plans, and remember the rhythms of nature." Everyone in the circle appeared to nod in agreement. While some of the presenters were more logical than others. Numerous references to the universe, life forces, and the term "alignment" appeared. It seems like everyone was in agreement that eclipses symbolize the magnificence of life and provide an opportunity to be amazed. 

Especially because my Spanish is so bad, I was afraid to voice my opinion. However, when it was my turn, I recounted my earlier eclipse experience, elaborating on how I wished to determine if I had maintained—during the intervening decades, particularly throughout the pandemic—the capacity to uphold my own accepted faith. Was I still capable of fully immersing myself in nature observation, unencumbered by the demands of adulthood? In my opinion, it's a true test, I stated. Is it possible for modern humans to go the full two minutes (the duration of this eclipse) without using some kind of electronic equipment to record the event or keep us connected to the outside world? 

The opportunity to conduct a meditation was extended by Sebastian Gonzales, a resident of Viña del Mar who identified himself as an eclipse hunter. After he had us all breathing deeply, he had us picture our feet sinking into the earth like roots. As you look up toward the stars, the alignment stretches from the Earth's core all the way to the sun, moon, and Milky Way. Connect with this cosmic period, when everything lines up and the energy flows," he suggested, "trying to connect with this wonderful time." 

I felt lost for a second or two when the meditation ended. Since we wouldn't be able to witness the eclipse, there was no point in continuing to plan the day around it. It was no longer raining, but the sky remained relentlessly cloudy. The lights started to go down and then went down much lower while I searched for someone to vent to. It was far more sudden, like the lights turning out in a theater, than the slow fading of evening. Later on, I'd come to understand that, in a way, I'd achieved my goal of not having any expectations. I was taken aback when the eclipse occurred after traveling a quarter of the globe just to witness it. 

Then a yell came from a field not far away. "El anillo! El anillo!" ( "The ring! The ring!" ). Under the umbrellas, a few guests had set up cameras in the hopes that the eclipse may be visible. I sprinted over and joined them in staring upwards to the spot where a tiny window of sky—not blue per se but devoid of the gloomy gray—began to open. As the clouds dipped like fleece, lifting briefly before settling back down, I struggled to believe my eyes or muster any semblance of optimism. From bright to dark and back again, and then, out of nowhere, a ring. The solar wind. The luminous circle held and flickered, yet it was whole. With reluctant whoops, the audience exploded. 

"Mira mira mira mira!" "Look, look, look!" someone exclaimed. Bandurrias, sometimes known as black-faced ibises, are famed for screeching shortly before dawn, and their boisterous call resonated from the hills around us, causing cameras to snap frantically. I could feel my pulse rate increase as the temperature plummeted. It looked like everyone around me was trembling at the same time. The cloud cover on the surrounding slopes was the same as it had been one, three, or fifteen minutes ago. An airy, yet victorious, halo had been fashioned by the sun above. It was as if fear had taken a back seat. Here, awe and optimism reigned. We were in dire need of a shock. I thought it was great news if the eclipse signaled the end of the world. 

In response to the two minutes and nine seconds of totality, cheers erupted. As we would find out later on, almost nobody else in Chile had witnessed the eclipse either. Possible onlookers from Pucón had hopped on buses and were rushing to the seaside, which was approximately 2½ hours distant, in the hopes of better weather. Oh well. At a mountain pass close to the Argentinean border, a group of astronomers had extended an invitation for us to join them. They hadn't seen a thing. 

An emigrant from Chile living in Germany sat down next to me at our last dinner that night. The expression of relief and joy on her face as she described the eclipse was one that was shared by everyone at the table. 

"I think it was even better than if we'd had good weather," remarked the woman. "Because all we were anticipating was complete silence. 'Hellooo!' came out of nowhere and then. Not to mention, we could have skipped the stupid goggles altogether. 

Raul Buenaventura of VM Elite has spent the better part of two decades arranging unique South American adventures, such as heli-skiing over the Andes and surfing in the Pacific. In preparation for the impending solar eclipse in Antarctica on December 4, he is now leading an expedition. Rent a tent for as little as $1,500 a night, all-inclusive. 

Under the title These Are the Days of Miracle and Wonder, this piece originally appeared in the June 2021 edition of Travel + Leisure written by John Bowe.