Here we see both totality and the diamond ring together side by side. Approximately 30 seconds seperate these images.

Perceptually the 1 minute and 40 seconds of totality seemed more like 30 seconds. Everything went by quickly.

It started with the temperature chilling down quickly accompanied by a light breeze. We could see everything on the ground outlined in sharp relief. The shadows were eerily sharp.

I could hear the crowd cheering and shouting as we approached the last part of the Sun to be covered by the Moon. I observed the thin crescent that remained through the small solar filtered refractor that I had brought along for myself and the numerous observers on the field.

As the volume of the crowd increased we approached totality with a different perception of our surroundings.

When it was safe to look, after nothing was visible in our solar eclipse glasses we gazed up at the black hole in the sky encircled by a blazing corona.