Many years ago I read a book by Admiral Daniel Gallery. In the book (probably Stand By-y-y, to Start Engines but I don’t remember for sure) he describes riding in a jet fighter over the ocean near sunset. By changing altitude his pilot was able to show them the green flash over and over as they watched the sun slide into the sea multiple times. I decided right then that I wanted to see the green flash some day, but since it usually only manifests over the sea when the horizon is clear I didn’t expect I ever would. In addition to writing several books that I enjoyed, he is the man who led the task force that captured the only German U-boat ever captured at sea.

Forty-five or fifty years later I found myself in the Schooner Bar on Explorer of the seas playing trivia and wishing that the sun wasn’t shining in the window with so much intensity. Then it reached the horizon and began to sink into the water. It slowly went from round to a semi-circle to just a sliver. Then it happened, the last bit of yellowy-orange disappeared and there was bright green flash that jumped up out of the water and had all five of us on the trivia team yelling in excitement that we had actually seen it. The woman running the trivia game looked at us and said, “Did you see the green flash?” We most definitely had, and for me at least it was the high point of the entire cruise.