The Ecstasy

We watched the news last night and the weatherman (Rusty!) ran four simulations for cloud coverage today. In all of them, it looked like our originally planned location for viewing the eclipse was still the best option. We were up and on the road at 7:15 am. Traffic was a bit slow in spots, but nothing like what I had feared. Our destination was the Tesla supercharger just south of Grand Island, NE.

Why this location? It had one of the longest periods of totality within a reasonable drive of Lincoln, a supercharger (so we could leave with a full “tank”) and a big travel center with facilities. The supercharger also guaranteed us a parking spot, in case the place was overcrowded. We arrived just after 8:30 and found 8 spots with just one Tesla in residence. By 10:30, there were 11 of us, including 3 of the Model X. We were fully charged, so we vacated our spot for one of the newcomers.

We expected to see other Tesla owners, due to the supercharger’s convenient location in the path of totality. What we didn’t expect is that it would turn into a mini Tesla convention. Half of the cars were from Minnesota. So, in addition to being in a prime eclipse location, we got to meet a lot of really nice fellow Tesla owners.

Our cameras were set up and ready to go 30 minutes before the start of the eclipse. The partial phase was pretty underwhelming and only visible through the eclipse glasses or the solar filter on my camera. The photos were pretty underwhelming as well. A few minutes before totality, the light began to dim noticeably. We were treated to the awesome spectacle of a 360 degree sunset.

I can’t adequately describe the experience of totality, except to say it was probably the most awe inspiring sight I have ever witnessed. Something like a religious experience, I would imagine. There is no photo and no video that can begin to capture it. We had a tiny bit of wispy cloud cover, but nothing that detracted from the experience. It was worth every bit of effort we put into getting there.

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