I don’t know if I qualify as an umbraphile, but I probably come pretty darn close. Actually, I didn’t even know what an umbraphile was until I might have become one. They are dedicated eclipse chasers who spend time and money, often going to extreme lengths, to be squarely in the path of totality.
But I’m not one to turn down a road trip so when my son, Bobby, asked me to accompany him and his son, Westyn, to the Texas hill country to watch the total eclipse, I was all in. Other members of our family apparently had better sense than to travel over 1,100 miles just to watch the moon pass between the Earth and the sun in just under four minutes.
But this was my last chance to see a total solar eclipse unless I live another 21 years to witness the next one which will cross the continental United States in 2045.
Bobby is definitely an umbraphile. He dragged his family to Rexburg, Idaho from his home in Neola, Utah on Aug. 21, 2017, to view the total eclipse. Although it was not as long of a trip as this one, the traffic gridlock on Interstate 15 took him nearly as long to get home as it did us last week. Much to our surprise last week, there were no traffic issues leaving Texas.
We spent a couple of days touring San Antonio’s many attractions and taking in the rich history of the area before deciding where we were going to find the best spot for viewing. We elected to drive an hour south of San Antonio on Interstate 10 to a rest stop near Kerrville to be in the center of the path of totality. We camped in a tent on the lawn of that inviting rest area.
The parking areas became overcrowded with vehicles of all kinds the next morning and we spoke with people from all parts of the U.S. and a couple from Germany who came especially to view the eclipse in totality.
There were a few people with high-tech cameras and equipment mounted on tripods to record the rare spectacle for posterity. Others just laid on their backs with solar glasses or binoculars to watch the event unfold. A San Antonio television crew even showed up to interview a few people early that morning.
The weather cast a shadow on the viewing experience by not allowing us to get the complete euphoria of the eclipse. We couldn’t see the stars and planets pop out when it got dark and we didn’t see the 360-degree sunset. However, the clouds parted at the right time to reveal the total eclipse and the “diamond” through a high layer of thin clouds. The day became night causing the automatic lights to come on at the rest area and the traffic on the highway and a chill filled the air as the moon blocked the sun. It was still an awesome experience.
Besides us, there were other Castle Valley folks traveling to their favorite locations to view the eclipse. Bob and Mary O’Brien were also in the hill country of Texas. Mary, who can definitely be classified as an umbraphile, was in Oregon for the last one in 2017 and she knew at the time that she wouldn’t miss this one.
The O’Briens camped on a ranch with “quite a jolly group” of people including several NASA engineers and specialists. One is an aurora borealis specialist and another is working on a planned trip to the moon.
Chuck and Ella Sabodski watched the weather and decided that Texas was going to be stormy so they traveled on to Russellville, Arkansas. Even there it was cloudy every day except the day of the eclipse so they had a perfect view of the event. They had a wonderful experience and mentioned how dark it got and the 20-degree drop in temperature. They stayed a few extra days to go ziplining.
Kirk and Ghia Cooley ended up in Broken Bow, Oklahoma, and had a “spectacular” experience as the event unfolded. They could even see the corona of the sun and said it was definitely “worth seeing.” They also stayed a few extra days to visit with family.
John Buchanan decided not to chase the totality path but set up his equipment here at home. He said that he had a small refractor telescope with a solar filter set up for viewing as well as a 400 mm telephoto lens on a camera for photography. It was almost clear through nearly the whole event with some high thin clouds creeping in at the very end.
He said it didn’t get very dark but he could feel the chill in the air around the peak eclipse. He had friends drop over to watch the event with him. There were probably other closet umbraphiles out there who travel long distances to view the eclipse like Kent and Cherise Udell, who were someplace in Mexico viewing it from a boat.
For the hard-core umbraphiles, there is a total eclipse in two years which will pass over Greenland, Iceland, and Spain but for the rest of us, we’ll have to wait for another 21 years for the next solar eclipse to travel across the continental United States. But for the Castle Valley umbraphiles, you won’t have to go far; it will pass right over Castle Valley.
