L.A.’s Clouds Quench ‘Ring of Fire’ Eclipse : Astronomy: In Orange and San Diego counties, people along the coast get a spectacular view.

Eclipse fervor hit Southern California on Saturday as thousands took to the beaches and hills in hopes of seeing the sun disappear, but for many the rare solar display known as the “ring of fire” was obscured by clouds.

The lucky ones were along the coast in Orange and San Diego counties, where clouds held off long enough to give a good view to the crowds who got through jammed roads to reach a vantage point looking over the ocean before sunset.

“There it is. It’s beautiful--it really is,” said Michael Kauper of Minneapolis, who watched at Moulton Meadows Park in the hills above Laguna Beach as the moon gradually slipped in front of the sun, leaving a thin ring of bright light surrounding a dark disc just above the horizon.

People came to one hillside in San Clemente from as far as Santa Cruz and Merced to watch. Those lengthy journeys amazed Paul Imbach, who only had to drive from his house at the bottom of the hill.

“This is just a little spot here,” Imbach said. “I was surprised to see so many people from so far away. I enjoyed it.”

At Griffith Observatory in the Hollywood Hills, a festive crowd of 15,000 scientists, hobbyists and the curious peered west at sunset. But moody Mother Nature broke up the party and sent them home disappointed.

“We can’t see anything,” said Jonathon Lee, a guide at the observatory who joined the eclipse-watching party. “Sure we’re disappointed . . . but it gives everyone a chance to show off their equipment.”

Fancy telescopes shared space at the railing outside the observatory with makeshift viewing glasses sold by vendors. David Sovereign, a member of the Los Angeles Astronomical Society, brought the shiniest toy--a 400-pound “Newtonian reflector” telescope mounted on a trailer--but left without seeing the rare annular eclipse.

“It would be very impressive--if you could see it,” Sovereign said.

The lure of the eclipse was so strong that roads to the observatory in Griffith Park were closed and onlookers were required to take shuttle buses from parking lots. Even though there was some blue sky overhead, the hoped-for break in the clouds near the horizon, where the eclipse could have been seen, never happened.

Evy and Herb Cades, a Van Nuys couple in their 70s, quipped that they would be back the next time an annular eclipse can be viewed in Southern California--in 20,000 years or so. “Same time, same place,” said Evy Cades.

Traffic was heavy on many parts of the coast from Ventura County to San Diego. Parking lots that are usually deserted in January were filled. In Laguna Beach, cars were backed up for miles on the two main routes into the city, and Main Beach was nearly as crowded as on the Fourth of July holiday.

Lois Wenholz sat on the edge of the beach and compared the experience favorably to the total solar eclipse she witnessed in Alaska in the 1960s.

“I am much more excited,” she said. “I have been anticipating this for a long time.”

Saturday’s eclipse was relatively rare because it occurred when the moon’s image was not quite as large as the sun’s, and thus not all of the sun was blocked out. Adding to the rarity was the timing of the eclipse at sunset.

Just as it set, 91% of the sun was blocked out by the moon, leaving a ring of light around it.

The moon appeared smaller because it was near the point in its orbit where it was farthest from the Earth. And the Earth was at the point in its orbit where it was nearest the sun, making the sun appear larger.

This kind of a annular eclipse occurs on Earth about once every one to three years. But it occurs at any given spot on Earth only once every 20,000 years.

So the anticipation was easy to understand.

“We’ve been absolutely swamped all day,” said Colleen Atkinson, office manager at the Arches Liquor Store in Newport Beach, which sold 2,500 viewing glasses during the last 10 days. “We sold out our last 600 this morning in about 90 minutes.”

Other eclipse-watchers took to the high seas to get a ringside seat of the solar spectacle. Scores of private vessels headed out of ports from Los Angeles to Dana Point, and more than half a dozen sportfishing charter outfits offered special eclipse voyages Saturday.

Jay Kimball, a Del Mar balloon pilot, took in the celestial show while drifting at 5,000 feet above San Diego County.

“It was pretty radical, it really was,” Kimball said.

Edwin Krupp, director of Griffith Observatory, dressed in a tuxedo for the occasion. “When you chase eclipses you miss a few and you catch a few,” Krupp said. “The enemy in an eclipse is clouds. They are always out there skulking.”

One of the few people at Griffith Park who was not disappointed by the cloud cover was Aaron McNeil, a blind bank agent from West Los Angeles who came with his wife, Sharron.

No matter that the eclipse was not glimpsed, said McNeil, one arm clutching his wife and the other her binocular case. He was enjoying himself, smiling as he soaked in the smell of hot pretzels and the sounds of amateur astronomers dispensing stargazing wisdom to squealing children and their parents.

But even without sight, McNeil said, he could feel the palpable dejection of those who waited patiently for a spectacular sight that was not to be.

“It’s like they’re all looking around,” he said, “hoping for something that will never come.”

Times science writer Lee Dye contributed to this story.