BOU AVENUE
Great American Eclipse 2017
A little more than a month ago, I wasn't even aware that there would be a
total eclipse of the sun over the continental United States on 21 August 2017. At the time, I was told that I could take two days off from work in
August, but because of personnel and scheduling constraints, I would only
be able to take those days off during the third full week of the month. I
chose the Monday and Tuesday (21st and 22nd) just because Thursdays and
Fridays tend to be lighter in terms of workload (with the odd chance of
being dismissed early on Fridays). By luck, an old work contact, with whom I have not been in touch with for
maybe two or three years, subsequently e-mailed me out of the blue, and
after some back and forth regarding work and summer plans, she mentioned
that she was heading south of the border to watch the eclipse. "What
eclipse??", I thought.After some research on the Internet, I realized that the opportunity to
witness my second total solar eclipse (I witnessed my first one in
Winnipeg in 1979) was too great to pass up even if it meant driving over
2000 kilometres round-trip over an extended 4-day weekend just to witness
a 2+ minute-long spectacle. The fact that the zone of totality would pass
right through the heart of Idaho was very appealing to me though. The
weather is generally sunny there, camping restrictions are few or
non-existent, and there are lots of great peak-bagging objectives.
As it turned out, my ambitious plan of watching the eclipse from the top
of a mountain did not pan out since I was utterly spent after two long
outings on Saturday and Sunday. Regardless, the solar eclipse on Monday
still looked amazing from my camping spot at Garden Creek Recreation
Site, and this one was just as memorable as the first one I witnessed 38
years earlier. I will always remember the sudden cooling of the air and
darkening of the sky, the cheers from everybody in the campground when
totality arrived, and the lady in the next camp playing Richard Strauss's
"Also sprach Zarathustra" (Theme from "2001: A Space Odyssey") and Bill
Withers' "Ain't No Sunshine" on her trumpet! Most of all, I
will remember how fleeting this wondrous moment was. Totality
lasted a little over 2 minutes, but it seemed to go by in a flash just as
it had 38 years ago. In retrospect, those 38 years also seemed to
go by in a flash, and I am reminded of how precious our time is here on
this planet.
Shortly after totality ended, I, like many others,
were already hitting the road for home (a 13-hour drive back to Calgary
for me including a bit of traffic congestion).
My mediocre photography skills aside, photos and
words simply do not do justice to the experience of witnessing a total
solar eclipse in person. There's nothing in the world quite like
it. For those of you that have never seen a total solar eclipse in
person, I refer you to this excellent
TED talk
for inspiration: "Before you die, you owe it to yourself to experience a total solar
eclipse."
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The Milky Way Galaxy stretches across
the sky at Garden Creek campground the night before the eclipse. |
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This is Sonny's campsite at Garden
Creek campground on the morning of the eclipse. |
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Though difficult to see in this
unfiltered photograph, the moon begins to eclipse the sun from top
right. |
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A nice lady from the big camp next to Sonny generously gave him a
spare set of certified eclipse viewing glasses to keep. |
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In this filtered photograph, the moon is nearly covering all of the
sun. |
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The sky begins to darken over the big camp next to Sonny's campsite. |
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This is an unfiltered photograph of totality showing the sun's
corona. Totality lasted a little over two minutes. |
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Later in the afternoon, smoke from a wildfire on Lolo Mountain near
Missoula, Montana threatens to obscure the sun. |
The sun disappears for good (at least for the day) over
the peaks in Glacier National Park (Montana).