ECLIPSED 2017

It was ALL Dave’s fault…. last year suggesting that we all meet up to watch the solar eclipse. Lander, WY was located in the area of totality… on the southern edge. Just happens that Lander is our hometown – Tilly and I had already planned to be there visiting my parents during that time.

Although we would be able to observe the full eclipse from our backyard… the totality would be short (30 – 40 seconds reported by my father who did watch it from the backyard). A bit of research and I discovered the the center of totality would pass almost exactly through a favorite fishing spot of ours…. we call it “bass lake” although I have never caught a single bass there. There we would be able to experience the longest period of totality & it was only a 50 minute drive from home -ON an ORDINARY day.

We headed off at 8 am … early enough to get to the Lake, set up our site and be ready for the start of the eclipse – about 10:30 am local time. As soon as we left town the traffic was heavy . At every roadside turnout , people were already parked parked – easy chairs set up. Anywhere they should pull out into a field they were set up…

It took us an extra 30 minutes to get to the turn toward Bass Lake… which was still 11 miles north. As soon as we were 1/2 mile from the highway, the crowds were left behind. There were other people at Bass Lake but we were able to set up inner own picnic shelter…

The spectacle began:

First “BITE”

The Crowd cheered!

HALFWAY!

The Crowd grew SILENT…

TOTALITY

The Crowd went wild!

I had spent a lot of effort trying to figure out how I could watch and photograph the eclipse without damaging my camera(s)… Plan A was to ‘project’ the suns image through my spotting scope onto a poster board … but the more I experimented, the more cumbersome the set up was. Plus, keeping the suns image in the center of the poster board as the sun moved was a pain.

I, finally went simple … a cardboard tube with a filter cannibalized from a pair of ‘eclipse glasses” … Afraid to use my DSLR I opted for my slightly better than a “point and shoot” Lumix… besides the cardboard tub fit the lens better…

MY efforts were rewarded with a picture of the “Diamong Ring”… The sight when the suns rays just emerged as the totality ends…

NOTE: For those of you already screaming “PHOTOSHOP”!!!

This is the image of my Lumix display- just after taking the shot.

Knowing I would be totally focused on the sun photos and wanting to remember the full experience, I set up my other “point and shoot” to video the lake as the totality occurred…

We had taken a picnic lunch with us … so we spent a leisurely 2 hours eating and relaxing… knowing the roads would be crowded as people had begun scurrying quickly off after the totality was over…. OUR drive home would be “EASY”

I have never before driven LA RUSH HOUR traffic in Wyoming … and hopefully, never will again. 2 1/2 hours to drive 40 miles…