Thread: Eclipse Plans - "Day of Darkness"

Glen, that boat looks to clean to have ever seen a fish.

Very nice lake glen. But is there really any excuse needed for an extra day on the lake?

Originally Posted by bluesman7

Ha! We avoided the interstate on the way home and despite going slow, and not actually making it home that day, it turns out that we went the fast way. People reported taking 10 hours to go from Glendo WY to Ft. Collins CO. about 160 miles on the interstate. We had plenty of food, water, and gasoline, as well as time so we just chilled and had a great trip.

Just heard the same from Sis up in Loveland, they decided that traffic was going to be just too much

Originally Posted by Hirlau

Glen, that boat looks to clean to have ever seen a fish.

It actually hasn't seen any at all

Long Long story about me and Idaho Fishing, the short version

Glen has simply never understood the concept of "Catch & Release"
Fishing in Idaho is MUCH easier then Fishing in Colorado
A freezer full of Half Gallon milk cartons with a few fish solidly frozen in water does not make for a Happy Wife
Pretty much the same story with Hunting up here

But yeah this boat is new for this season and I doubt a pole will ever come on board

Who knows though, she had Cast Iron Fried Fresh Walleye at a friend's Fish Fry and that perked her taste buds.. hehehe

Hey long time no see, everyone

30 years ago when I was in gradeschool, I found a kids astronomy book that had a list of upcoming total solar eclipses, and I made a mental note of Aug 21, 2017. Been looking forward to this one for a long time - booked a hotel long in advance. We made ghetto filters for binos, an old camcorder, and direct visual observing with some old white light baader solar film I had laying around from the last partial eclipse I bought stuff for probably back in '14 and some dollar store posterboard. Didn't plan on taking my telescopes as they're big bulky things, plus I didn't want to mess with a lot of stuff as this was my first total and I didn't want to miss a lot of totality messing with equipment.



this is basically what I did with the binos, stock photo


Hitched my star to a wagon in missouri with some astronomy buddies I met online and hoped for good weather. Took the kids out of school and the day off work and we (plus mrs hoglahoo) drove up to a spot nearly on the center path a few miles from greatest duration. The forecast was pretty bad leading up to it, but we had a great bbq Sunday evening and were pretty resigned to cloudy or even rainy skies. I was even considering heading to Tennessee in the middle of the night because I really wanted to ensure I got to see the corona, but eventually decided to just stick it out where we were. Luckily, the clouds stayed at bay and we had a great look. My older kid was given assignments by a couple of his teachers to make observations so I was helping him a little with that as well. Had his old cheapie camcorder on a tripod.


One of these dogs drooled on my plate


I've seen several partial eclipses through the years, so I was pretty nonplussed about the leadup to totality, but super hyped about totality itself. The temp gradually dropped and sky got darker of course, adding to the hype as the time approached - I kinda knew what to expect, but nothing really prepared me for those final two or three seconds when the moon cut off the last of the sun's light, it was just phenomenal like Glen said. Almost magical to see such an alien yet eerily familiar-looking thing suddenly floating in the false twilight where the sun had just been. My binos are 20x so I got a nice look at the corona and a peek at the two large prominences that were visible. kid got some decent video and photos for what he had, and I took a few pics myself right before totality ended. We had about 2m 40s of it - a few people groaned when the moon moved on and it got hot again. It was a long, delay-ridden drive back home but worth it. Glad to see Glen started a thread on it, and happy y'all who got to see it were able to Kinda wish I was on Glen's boat, very pretty scenery (even with the grayer hair )

It was dark enough at totality that shadows were faint


somehow we ended up taking three different videos, none of them were much to look at, but the excitement is captured pretty well I think


bonus photo from astromony bud with the good equipment setup next to us with prominences, good corona detail and even lunar maria from earthshine
http://ozastro.ca/images/eclipse_repro1.jpg

What part of Missouri were you in, Hoglahoo?

I was in Northeast MO. We were lucky to get a several glimpses of the eclipse at the start and very tail end of the event. We had rain and thunderstorms during most of the eclipse. I ended up watching a livestream broadcast in a planetarium.

My setup-never got a pic

Sorry to hear that - what happened to you is exactly what I was starting to expect in the days leading up I was about 40 miles south of StL, just north of Farmington

Never saw a blessed thing, the moon got in the way.

I've thought a lot about the eclipse since seeing it. The image of looking at where the sun used to be, and seeing a black hole surrounded by the corona is burned into my brain.

Three hundred miles from home, we did not leave until 2:40 and therefore subjected ourselves to a lot of traffic. I've been telling people that if I had it to do over again, including the traffic that we experienced, I would do it in a second. Actually if given the chance I would go about three times as far as we did, no question.

My relationship with the sun and the moon are very different now. Intellectually nothing has changed, but emotionally, a lot has. Next one close to me is in 2024. I hope that I can make it.