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April 8th Eclipse - Anyone else doing a road trip?

Jimbosc

Jimbosc

Heisman
Mar 27, 2018
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We are headed to St Louis on Sunday - and jumping of to southern IL for actual observation of the eclipse on Monday. The weather forecast has not looked great until the last 12 hours or so (still a chance of being partly cloudy but it appears to be about the same for everyone not in the North East US).

I see quite a bit of buzz about people going to Texas - which is also benefiting from the latest forecast.

Gonna be interesting. My first attempt to see a total eclipse on the path of totality. And probably my last....lol.
 
We live in Central Texas just north of Austin and are already in the path of totality. It will be interesting to see the masses of people as they come into the area. A lot of "conspiracy theories" out there about what may happen on that date. We are already seeing some of the effects of it on our grocery store shelves. Safe travels to you and yours Jimbo!
 
General things to be aware of if you are planning to drive into any place with at least some population:
- Cell phone towers will be overloaded - assume they won't work or will be spotty
- Your phone will drain quickly trying to connect so plan on charging way more than you normally do
- Getting into your planned spot won't be too bad (exceptions I am sure will occur in major cities) but plan on long lines to get out once it is over
- Services will be buried with people - gas up early, bring food and drinks, and your patience
- Don't look at the sun directly - don't point your camera at it either until the total eclipse occurs (so you need eclipse glasses, and a filter for your camera if you plan to shoot the partial eclipse

Probably others I have read but those all seemed relevant.

Our target spot favorable forecast continues.....
 
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Also if you are going to any ace in the path of totality make sure you get in a couple days early. My mom and I stopped at the Walmart in Cape Girardeau last night and they are out of a lot of items. Thankfully we were able to get every thing we need.
 
SUHnami said:
Also if you are going to any ace in the path of totality make sure you get in a couple days early. My mom and I stopped at the Walmart in Cape Girardeau last night and they are out of a lot of items. Thankfully we were able to get every thing we need.
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Which way from Cape Girardeau is your family farm? I have been around the Millersville area. Beautiful area but you need to work on straightening your roads.
 
Walked out to the end of my driveway and had a pretty awesome view even though we had some cloud cover they parted at just the right moment. Was a lot cooler than I thought it would be. Hope you all had a great experience as well!
 
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ATX_Husker said:
Walked out to the end of my driveway and had a pretty awesome view even though we had some cloud cover they parted at just the right moment. Was a lot cooler than I thought it would be. Hope you all had a great experience as well!
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My mom and I experienced totality on our family farm. Was one of the coolest things I've ever experienced. The temp dropped from 77 to the low 60s. It was very dark.
 
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GI's view, while not totality was still pretty awesome. 4th solar eclipse I've seen: '63, '85, '17 and now '24. The eclipse in '17 was just incredible. It was not pitch black but pretty dark and just a bit eerie. GI was around 75% of totality. It was "twilighty" for lack of a better description. The best indicator that something was going on was that our bird feeders were just about deserted. Even the squirrels thought it was getting towards bedtime.

Hoping I'll get to see another one yet before I go.
 
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Woo hoo! Back from our road trip to McLeansboro IL - which was dead center on the path of totality so we got over 4 minutes of total eclipse. I am so glad we planned this and got to experience it - so many things I could describe about the sensory experience but the main thing was the first time I looked at the total eclipse after removing my eclipse glasses the first thing I said was "this was so worth the trip!"....lol

Only real bad part was the ride home. Google maps advised avoiding St Louis on the real time traffic - so we head north into IL on I-57. Then spent about 6 hours in bumber to bumber slow moving traffic. Once we got to I-39 and headed toward Madison (and ultimately Rochester) things cleared up enough you could go the speed limit. In terms of actual delay - the slow traffic added about 2 - 2 1/2 hours to the total drive home. Which ended up being 3 AM....

Ah well - I had the next day off work for just that reason!
 
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In retrospect I would have planned a more back road path out of southern IL to get back to Missouri by avoiding St Louis - but hey hindsight is 20 20. It was a safe ride home if longer than ideal. The next 2 events are 2044 and 2045. I will be pushing 80 by then. My guess is this was my one time to do it and I am Ok with that.
 
Jimbosc said:
In retrospect I would have planned a more back road path out of southern IL to get back to Missouri by avoiding St Louis - but hey hindsight is 20 20. It was a safe ride home if longer than ideal. The next 2 events are 2044 and 2045. I will be pushing 80 by then. My guess is this was my one time to do it and I am Ok with that.
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I hear ya there. I'll be in my 70s for those 2. That's why I'm glad I made it to this one. Definitely was on my bucket list.
 
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