Not So Frozen
Due to my experience on Friday morning, when I went to bed last night, I made sure I was set for the cold. I had a sweater tucked into the bottom of my sleeping bag for my feet, two extra blankets on top of me and I was wearing my winter gloves inside the sleeping bag. My toes still got plenty cold, but it was a lot easier than the previous day. I also don’t think it was quite as cold.
Company
My friend, Shon, texted me around 7 AM letting me know he’d arrive in about an hour, so I reluctantly got out of bed and began breaking-down camp. While I didn’t get it completely taken care of, I was pretty far along when he arrived. We started a fire and caught up while we waited for the sun to clear the canyon walls.
The Eclipse
During my travels to this point, I’d been preparing myself mentally for the possibility that the eclipse wouldn’t be viewing because of clouds. When I first decided to take this trip, eight months ago in February, even then, I knew that planning a trip around seeing an eclipse was risky business and I had to be ready for things to not work out the way I’d wanted them to.
This makes the fact that the skies were perfectly clear from the time the sun cleared the canyon walls at 10 AM–already about a third of the way to annularity–to the time we left so satisfying. It really made me feel blessed in a way. My friend, Shon, and I took astronomy class together in high school and got to see the annular eclipse in 1994 as well. We made plans then to get together to see the total eclipse that will pass over Ohio all the way back then. So, to have him make the trip up from San Diego to experience this eclipse with me was a special moment.
A Delayed Exodus
While I’m not a local, personally, I didn’t think there would be the type of massive traffic issues like I experienced after the total eclipse I saw in Tennessee back in 2017, but we decided to hang-out until the end of the eclipse before heading out. The drive to Kanab, Utah, where we both had our rooms, was an easy two hours of beautiful scenery.
Hanging-Out and Ending the Day
Upon arriving in Kanab and checking into my room, I took a long shower. I’m not sure if I ever smelled as bad as this. Two days of no showers and campfire smoke is a nasty combination. After the shower, I logged media and got a load of clothes washing while I hung-out with Shon. Then, we got a hot meal and spent the rest of the night listening to music and catching-up more. Finally, I laid down to bed and fell asleep quickly, satisfied with the fact that the big question mark of the trip was resolved in such a great way.
Image Gallery
- Clear Skies There was a bit of haze and some light clouds early on, but they passed before the sun cleared the canyon walls.
- Castle Rocks You can see some of the early clouds we had to deal with. There was some doubt, but when it got close, we could tell they'd be moving out.
- Cacti!!! Only this morning did I notice these scattered about. I can't believe I didn't step on one while wandering around in the dark.
- Getting Close Taken with a lens from a pair of eclipse glasses over my iPhone camera.
- Annularity Even an annular eclipse is amazing to witness. You have to leave your glasses on to see it, but it is still mind-blowing.
- Annularity Taken with a lens from a pair of eclipse glasses over a camcorder.
- Roaming Stone Placement Before leaving, I left the stone I made especially for the event at my campsite.
Video Gallery
- 2023 Utah Eclipse View Location As seen from Fremont Indian State Park in Utah. Shot using a Canon HF R500 camcorder with the lens from a paper eclipse viewing glasses taped to the lens. This required a high level of zooming-in making it very difficult to find and keep the sun in place.
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