Thousands scan skies for glimpse of 'amazing' solar eclipse

Thousands of people today flocked to get a glimpse of the solar eclipse, with leaden skies marring the view in most places except Europe's remote north where spectators described the sight as "amazing".
Die-hard eclipse enthusiasts who flew in to the Faroe Islands and Norway's Arctic Svalbard archipelago - the only places where the less than three-minute total eclipse was visible - were rewarded with the best views.
"We had clouds... But it was still fantastic," said Ole J. Knudsen, an astrophysicist from Denmark's Aarhus University, who watched from hills high above the Faroes capital Torshavn.
"You could see the shadow come up behind the clouds. For 20 to 30 seconds the sky was covered and it became dark and there was a collective shock that you could hear from all the spectators," he said.

"It was worth all the money."
More than 8,000 tourists had gathered in the Faroes, a Danish autonomous territory in the North Atlantic.

The views were equally breathtaking in Svalbard's main town Longyearbyen.
To a background din of yelping sled dogs and in bracing bracing -20 Celsius (-4 Fahrenheit) morning air, Kathy Biersdorff, from Calgary in Canada, and her companions shouted out what they saw: "Crescent shadows! Diamond ring! Chromosphere! Moon's shadow."
"Oh man... This is so amazing. I've never seen so many phenomena during an eclipse," she said.
But elsewhere, most of those who headed outside to watch the moon pass between Earth and the sun were left disappointed by cloud cover.

An eclipse of varying degrees was first visible across northern Africa, most of Europe, northwest Asia and then the Middle East.
Spain's Canary Islands were one of the first places the partial eclipse was visible, early today.
"We can see perfectly well the disc of the moon... It is one of the most marvellous astronomical spectacles you can see," Alfred Rosenberg, an astrophysicist at the Canaries Astrophysics Institute told AFP from the island of Tenerife.
In the Swedish capital Stockholm, a crescent-shaped sun shone through overcast skies as temperatures dropped, prompting people in the city's business district to stop and take pictures with their smartphones.

But elsewhere, observers were disappointed by the grey skies that ruined their view.