Planning the trip for observing Total Solar eclipse is crucial. You need to determine the best spot where to see the longest the totality.
So I have started preparing for the trip step by step. I have booked the flight tickets already! I bought through www.greitai.lt Finnair return flight for just 1946Lt(~£490) to Shanghai.
The Total Solar Eclipse is 22nd July, 2009.
Greatest Eclipse in Wuhan region 1:26:49 UT, 9:26am in local time. Seems will have to get up early!
More info about Eclipse upcoming and past Total Solar Eclipses in Nasa wesbite here.
The Sun shadow movement in China:
I recon than the most comfortable place for observing would be Wuhan, since the chance of clear skies in there is 60%, meanwhile in Shanghai only around 50%. Besides much more fun to watch a small town, than in multimillion city like Shanghai. Also smog in a such big city like Shanghai could prevent the good visibility, especially in the morning, since the sun will be really low.
I was also checking where is the next Total Solar Eclipse and it turns out 11 July, 2010 in Easter island! Such a mystical place with a huge head status of extinct civilisation. But the problem is getting there.
I just checked the flight prices out of curiosity to the Easter Islands. Can you guess? The tickets were 4500Lt (~£1125). Well if you search very well maybe it is possible to find for 4000Lt (£1000), but still a lot, compared to the price to China and by calculations overall would cost around 20,000Lt (~£5000). A bit too much for this time.