Not so much unexplained...
Now I know this doesn't fit the requirements of the question entirely, but at the time it was happening, I was convinced it was some kind of supernatural or otherworldly occurance, so it's partially relevant.

~~~Wavy flashback with harp sound~~~

Back when I was about 9-10 years old, I had just moved to Cyprus with my parents and sister a year previously. My dad worked in Saudi Arabia for BAE so it was convenient for him to come visiting, my mum loved the sun and way of life here, and she didn't want us getting drugged up or knifed in the UK schools, so it worked out for us too.

Anyway, one time when my dad came visiting, we decided to hire a car and have a drive over to the west side of the island (we lived in Ayia Napa at the time), and check out Limassol, the roman ruins, Paphos, the castle, etc. etc. Fun day out.

Anyway, time passes, the day's over, we head back. This would be a summertime evening, about 7ish as we drive home. That's when we saw it.

On the final stretch of motorway, heading directly East, we notice this huge deep orange ball on the dusky horizon. I mean MASSIVE. Easily at least 4-5 times as large as the sun appears in the sky. And the sky around it was this kind of forboding bloody red.
At this point, my juvenile mind is racing with possibilities of alien invaders and UFOs landing on little beach towns on tiny islands. I was expecting to see laser blasts going through the sky as we got closer. What made it even worse was the fact that there seemed to be a very disproportionate number of cars moving in the opposite direction, AWAY from the large dome of doom we were headed towards.

For a few strangely elongated minutes (isn't it odd how time seems to extend when you really don't want it to?), I was excreting masonry and hoping our new overlords would be nice to me, until eventually we arrived home without passing by any visible signs of death or destruction.

It got dark and the Moon rose higher into the sky, its colour faded a little. I still think it looked larger that night than it ever has done before or since though.

Turns out that it's an optical illusion caused by the Moon's closeness to more relatable sized objects on or around the horizon which just makes it seem larger. I guess that combined with the sunset sky just magnified the effect that little bit more to make it super-scary to childrens.

Not so scary as an adult I guess though. Or particularly unexplained what with that last paragraph. Oh well, I did warn you!
(LLamaBoy skived off work on, Mon 7 Jul 2008, 10:24, Reply)