Total Solar Eclipse in Oregon 8-21-17

[Cory Hilby]

See my post under Patrick's old solar eclipse post from last year!

[gordon2]

Originally Posted by Cory Hilby

See my post under Patrick's old solar eclipse post from last year!

Looks like you are refering to this post you made:
http://www.fiberglassrv.com/forums/f...tml#post638815

And BTW, Patrick's old post was not from last year, it was from 2008! And he has not posted anything here since 06-28-2016.

Anyway, I will be in SC for the 2017 eclipse. I think I have a better chance of clear skies then there will be in Oregon.

[Cory Hilby]

Now, now, don't scare people away from eastern Oregon. The Cascade mountains divide the state, and on the west side, I agree, chances are fairly good there'll be some clouds. But all that moisture comes out when the winds cross the mountains, so eastern Oregon is basically a desert and rain very unlikely.

[Gordon in Idaho]

Cory,

That poster (?) is really nice. Did you make it? In your neck of the woods I'd head for the painted hills. Got to be out of this world!
In my case, I'll be in the Sawtooth Mtns. in eastern Idaho. At 10:30 mountain time, the sky should be just about free of clouds. I'm more concerned about smoke from wildfires at that time of year. Hope for the best!

Gordon

[Cory Hilby]

The Sawtooths should be really nice! The poster is on the City of John Day Eclipse website. I asked about it and real-life posters are being sold at their Visitor's Center--two different kinds. They're going to send me an email with some info so I can order by mail as I suspect they'll be all sold out by the time I get there personally!

[John in Santa Cruz]

Our Casita and us will be in Madras, at the Oregon Solarfest... We reserved a full hookup RV site early last year, they are LONG gone... in fact all on site camping is long gone.

If you happen to make it to this event (there's dry camping a couple miles north with shuttle service), we're the casita + silver tacoma that will be in the RV park, probably parked next to a silver Mercedes Sprinter/Winnebago belonging to another member of my astronomy club.... Swing by and say HI!

Madras is in one of the belts of the highest probability of being 100% clear on the day-of... we'll be arriving late Thursday and leaving Tuesday.

[Cory Hilby]

I did find the Madras website after I looked at John Day. True, no hookups at all and no available sites at the location of the "Solarfest" (?which appears to be something of a band festival?), but as of a week or so ago there were still boondocking sites available at an associated field 4 miles south. So don't give totally up on going to Madras!

[John in Santa Cruz]

yeah, "Solar Town' is basically a huge farm field they are going to grid out into campsites, with some sort of water distribution, and portapotties, there's still plenty of room left there.

The fairgrounds will likely be typical county fair scene, with music, food booths, entertainment, etc, also eclipse talks and events with NASA and other astronomers...

If you do go there, DO NOT MISS the Erickson Aircraft Collection, at the airport across the highway from SolarTown, and a few miles north of the Fairgrounds, they have an amazing collection of fully operational WW-II war birds. They told me they are planning on flights all weekend, great fun if you're into that kind of thing. Erickson Aircraft Collection | Erickson Madras | Oregon Aviation Museum

[Gordon in Idaho]

There are some nice primitive BLM campgrounds along the John Day River, north of the fossil beds, and a nice FS campground more to the north. Check out the Monument site for a map.
Here's what they're saying about that week at John Day:
"We anticipate very large crowds August 15th - 22nd, so expect traffic delays, congested parking lots, and that areas that are normally open may be closed and/or open to foot traffic only."

Woodstock???

Gordon

[biw314]

Here's the go-to map for historical cloud cover.

http://eclipsophile.com/wp-content/u...raph-MODIS.jpg

[Doug in Sacramento]

I checked on availability at a RV park in the totality zone in eastern Oregon last year. They had a waiting list for the eclipse. They said there would be a three day minimum at $385 per day! I said "no thanks." On November 17th at 12 AM I logged onto the Oregon State Parks website and after 20 minutes of frantic clicking, the reservation site for Cove Palisades State Park appeared and I reserved a site for 8/17-22. I was so happy!! I checked the next morning and everything was reserved.

We'll look forward to seeing some of you in the high desert of Oregon.

[Civilguy]

Originally Posted by Doug in Sacramento

I checked on availability at a RV park in the totality zone in eastern Oregon last year. They had a waiting list for the eclipse. They said there would be a three day minimum at $385 per day! I said "no thanks." On November 17th at 12 AM I logged onto the Oregon State Parks website and after 20 minutes of frantic clicking, the reservation site for Cove Palisades State Park appeared and I reserved a site for 8/17-22. I was so happy!! I checked the next morning and everything was reserved.

We'll look forward to seeing some of you in the high desert of Oregon.

Doug,

The Oregon State Parks Foundation reserved 30 spaces at Cove Palisades for Friday through Tuesday to auction off and support the foundation. I considered that it might be worth $500 to support the Foundation as we like the parks in Oregon. Then, as we learned that this has become an "international event", we decided we are basically just too crowd-adverse and booked different vacation plans for the preceding week.

The auction started last Friday. The first six spaces finalized last night with prices ranging from $1,909 to $3,425. Of course, that includes all four nights!

There is now another 24-hour countdown running until 8:00 tonight. I have been watching this with great interest. It looks like the Foundation will do very well.

I don't know if it's a possibility for you, but my brother described watching the total eclipse from a hilltop in 1979. He says you could watch the shadow of the moon whistle by at some 1,000's of miles per hour.

Have a great time on your trip!

[Doug in Sacramento]

I've read that observing an eclipse from a high point is awesome, like a freight train going bust thousands of miles per hour. I'll look for a tall hill.

Forget what 5 nights are costing me but I know it's less than $200. The auction is a good idea, though.