Weather Overview

After the frigid winter eclipse of 1997, Nature now treats us to a sub-tropical extravaganza during the final months of the northern hemisphere winter. While the land-based choices are relatively limited for this track (in comparison with that upcoming in 1999), the weather prospects are generally very favorable.

The eclipse track passes over the Pacific's equatorial doldrums, skipping through the Galápagos before landing on the Pacific shores of Panama and Colombia. Even this area, one of the wettest in the world, is in the midst of its dry season, with subdued cloudiness and rainfall. Over the Andes into northern Colombia and Venezuela the track enters a very dry, sunny climate with cooling trade winds. February is the dry season in this already desiccated area, so the prospects for sunny skies are very good. Farther east, over the Leeward Islands, cloud cover increases slightly, but fine weather persists into the mid Atlantic.

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