I just read the Northern lights are going to be visible in 17 states on Thursday. I’m currently on vacation in one of those states in the north that is supposed to have great visibility. Gotta say I’m kind of excited! Anyone else?
Also the solar eclipse is to happen on April 8, 2024. I went into totality the last time, not expecting much, and it was SO cool. Highly recommend going into totality! I already have my hotel reservation for it. There will not be another solar eclipse visible in the US until 2044.
Last spring, I thought I was way ahead of the game booking a hotel room for the solar eclipse, over a year in advance. Turns out I was at the end of the line, at least for the area I was targeting, and was lucky to get a room at all.
I have a hotel reservation in San Antonio for 2024. Drove up to Oregon from the Bay Area for the 2017 eclipse and it was spectacular. Not at all what I expected, which was a little corona around the moon. Turns out the corona stretched across half the sky.
I too drove up to Oregon from the Bay Area in 2017. It was such an amazing trip. We camped on the McKenzie River and hiked to some amazing waterfalls just in time for the eclipse.
This winter we went to the Arctic circle in Norway to see the northern lights. It was truly incredible—we were lucky to see them right from the hot tub and deck in our hotel, as well as on a couple of tours that took us into the darkest night skies.
Can you tell me where in Norway you went to see the lights, and what month, please? it’s on our bucket list. We are in Northern Norway now, but we have midnight sun and it’s 76 degrees. We just went swimming in the outdoor pool on our ship!
It faces the Alta River and every room has huge windows and a deck. We watched the lights right from our deck! We were there in mid February. We also stayed for one night in their ice hotel, which is built each year anew.
It will again pass right over Carbondale, but this time from Northeast to Southwest, starting across the state line from Vincennes, IN, and continuing down to Carbondale and Marion, and then onto Cap Girardeau in MO.
We’ll be in Ohio, and we can choose between Cleveland, Dayton, parts of Columbus or north of Cincinnati. It’s also passing right over Indianapolis and Terre Haute as well.
For New Yorkers, Buffalo is directly in the path of the , as is Rochester.
Anybody who wants to make a full tour out of it can see the eclipse from either side of the Niagara falls.
I highly recommend that anybody who’s never been in a complete eclipse ind a way to do so. It is surreal. First you start noticing the fact that the light is dimmer, as though the sun is weakening. It is very noticeable and messes with you a bit. At totality things do go dark, birds go quiet, crickets start chirping. However, while at dawn or dusk there is one side where the horizon is light and the other where the horizon is dark, during the totality, it’s 360 degrees of light horizon. The shadows also start messing up.
It is so weird and so worthwhile.
A couple of photos from the 2017 one (my wife had a good camera):
I totally agree that the totality is worth traveling for. I insisted on traveling for the one in 2017 (it was w/in driving distance for us, no hotel needed) and I am so glad I did. Friends here who didn’t travel posted pictures of the partial like they saw something big, but the real show is in the totality. It’s hard to explain to someone who hasn’t seen it.
This difference with this eclipse is the weather – spring in (for example) Cleveland is not a clear-sky sure thing by far so it’s harder to commit to a destination. OTOH, totality is much longer duration this time.
DH and S1 travelled far to be in totality last time and it did not disappoint. I was home with my cereal box pinhole camera explaining eclipses to my coworkers during our time. DH said part of the experience was how excited everyone was, at the same time, for the same thing. We forget these days how nice that can be.
