Monday 20 December

Another quiet day, and as I type this, the sun is sinking towards the southwestern horizon, due to set at 3.34pm. It'll be the shortest day of the year tomorrow, and it'll start in a spectacular fashion: with a lunar eclipse just before sunrise in the UK. The lunar eclipse starts in earnest just after 6 am (UK time), with totality just after 8 am and ending at around 10 am. This means that the moon sets during the eclipse. Here in Stornoway, the moon will set just after 9 am, leaving me with a pretty good display.

There will be a partial solar eclipse at sunrise on 4 January 2011, visible from Europe.

I'll be admiring tomorrow's lunar eclipse from Stornoway Airport, as I'm flying across to Amsterdam. I'm so glad I've changed my booking, as British Airways appears to be in meltdown. Its website is going round in square circles and doesn't do what it's supposed to do. I am positively horrified at the scenes at Heathrow, where people are resigned to sit on the floor until Thursday.

Unless something else crops up, this will be my last posting for 2010 on Atlantic Lines. I expect to resume entries from Stornoway on Thursday 6 January 2011. During my stay in Holland I'll be blogging on the Shell Gallery; updates on my journey tomorrow will be made on Facebook and Twitter.