Pacific Evening

As the evening twilight fades away in this remote island in the Pacific Ocean, bright stars of Alpha and Beta Centauri, and the Southern Cross appear over the passing clouds. Lower in the horizon Canopus, the second brightest star in the entire night sky, shortly appears through the clouds. This pacific paradise in the southern hemisphere is Mangaia, the most southerly of the Cook Islands. This volcanic remnant has the distinction of being the oldest island in the Pacific dating back to about 18 million years ago. As noted by the photographer “I traveled to this 10km wide island with only 500 Polynesian residents because the total solar eclipse path of 11 July 2010 were passing over this location. The twilight lasts short and it gets dark pretty quick in the tropics and there was a very short window to capture colors like this before twilight fades.”