Total Eclipse, August 2017

The Eclipse Trip August 20-22, 2017
Airplane vs. automobile? Time saver vs. flexibility. I opted for the former since I had just come off two long driving trips to the Pacific northwest.

A mid-morning Southwest flight to Salt Lake City via Oakland (Southwest had very few non-stops LAX to SLC. In prior winters, they had 7 or 8 a day.) Parked the car at the airport in Park One which I used to do regularly, but have not done in years. It now has a dozen electric charging stations, but they appear to all be in the valet parking area.) The flights were full and on-time. Even handed out peanuts and on the first flight they appeared to be handed out by a father and son volunteer team. They were not wearing airline uniforms.

A problem arose when I went to pick up my car from the off-airport, Fox Rent a Car, via Priceline. There were no cars. The Manager explained that about 25 renters had not returned their cars per their reservations. I wondered if some people decided at the last minute to stay for the eclipse, or more devious, always intending to view the eclipse, attempted to avoid the awesomely inflated car rental rates by stating that they intended to return the car before the eclipse. The manager promised to honor the reservation by renting from another company and absorbing the difference. So, we got back on the shuttle bus and headed back to the Budget counter at the airport. The clerk there claimed to have no record of our reservation, but said that she had a car available for $350. I could not reach the Fox people, nor anyone at Budget since none of their phone numbers get you to a live person. So back on the bus back to Fox. They checked and verified the reservation, but could also not reach Budget by phone. So, this time the Fox clerk (who was on temporary assignment form Las Vegas) came back with us to the airport. The Budget clerk claimed that she had not received the reservation and that reservations normally take 50 minutes to appear in the system (this had now taken more than 1.5hrs). The Fox clerk took us back to his office and gave us a big black Jeep SUV. I suspect that someone else did not get a car.

Because I delayed searching for them, and when I did late in the week all locations were sold out, we did not have the special glasses needed to view the partial eclipse (You could view the total eclipse without glasses without harming your eyes). Making one last chance we stopped at two 7-11s outside the car rental site. The first was sold out, but at the second we got the last two pairs of glasses, albeit at an exorbitant price. Dynamic pricing, but it made the experience much more enjoyable!
We drove up to Layton toward our reservation at the Comfort Inn. I feared that it too would be a problem, but there were no issues, other than John Oliver’s show came on at 9:15pm.
We got up at 5:30 the following morning to make sure that we got up to southern Idaho in time for the “Great American Eclipse”. By now radio, TV and the newspapers were filled with eclipse information. At least it drove Trump off the news, at least temporarily. Ate a quick breakfast and got on the road, I-15 by 6:45. To my surprise, the drive did not present much congestion. There were a few occasions when traffic slowed, but that appeared to be caused primarily by the presence of a police car in the median.

As we approached Idaho Falls after 9 we began to see groups of people hanging out in parks and open spaces. We decided to go to Rigby, a small town about 20 miles northeast of Idaho Falls since it was squarely in the middle of the path of totality. After driving through town and not seeing an obvious public restroom, we parked at South Rigby Park by about 9:45. There were a few thousand people there, but it was next to the Rigby Rodeo Grounds, and not crowded. There were lots of dogs, mountains of food, and more photography equipment than is probably in the Kodak Museum.
At about 10:05 the moon began to move over the sun. At first it looked like a small bite had been taken out of the sun but the dark spot steadily grew large. I was surprised that there was no noticeable decrease in light until near the end of the process, although the color of the light began to be whiter and wintry. By about 11:20 the sun was just a crescent and the air was very noticeably colder. Right on time, at 11:33 there was a flash of white light and then darkness. The sun was completely obliterated by the moon. Surrounding the sun was the corona, a very white, almost cloudy protrusions of varying shapes and sizes from the sun. We could now take our special glasses off. It was cool, but not life altering or he most momentous event in one’s life as some speakers on radio had said. The crowd oohed and awed, but no wild shouting or emotional outbursts. The dogs did not seem perturbed.

It was over quickly, 2 minutes and 17 seconds, but it seemed quicker. The sun’s partial reappearance was marked by a flash of white light, that was a signal to put the glasses back on, and quickly the sun appeared as a small crescent. It took almost 1.5 hrs. for the sun to fully reappear.
The crowd quickly thinned out, and the highway adjoining the park, which had almost been deserted, quickly became a slow-moving parking lot.

Hoping to wait out the heavy traffic before starting our drive back to Salt Lake City we ate a picnic lunch at the Park. That probably was a mistake since when we did get on the road at 1:30, we quickly encountered heavy traffic, to the point of gridlock. I got off the main road to circumvent downtown Idaho Falls and the highway intersections. I took some back roads and encountered some traffic, but once south of Idaho Falls the only alternative to I-15 was state route 97 which was a single lane gridlocked mess. I-15 quickly got very crowded to the point that there were several 5-10-minute stretches when traffic did not move at all. It took 3 hours to go 30 miles. Traffic lightened up after Pocatello, but after the I-15 84 interchange there again was heavy traffic. The trip took 7 hours (twice as long as going up there) and we did not get back to Salt Lake until 8:30 and as a result my plans to have a night in Salt Lake City were dashed. We walked around the Mormon complex before it closed at 10 and then had difficulty finding a restaurant open at that hour. Fast food again. 
The Salt Lake Plaza Hotel was very nice and we used its shuttle to return to the airport in the morning. Uneventful flight home. A lot of time and effort to see the total solar eclipse, but it was worth seeing, once. I do not understand those people who chase these events all over the world.

Bryce Canyon National Park

August 5-6, 2017 Hoodoos to Home
This is the second half of my trip back from Glacier National Park after dropping y spouse off last night at the SLC airport.

Got up early, about 7, after a good night’s sleep. Started the day with an OK, typical Hampton's Inn breakfast. Nothing wonderful, but filling.  I got there early so there were still grapefruit slices in the fruit bowl. By the time I left there were lots of people down for breakfast, but contrary to my prior Hampton’s Inn experiences, the staff came out with lots of refills.

I had thought about going on the Mormon Temple tour, there was room on the 9:00 tour, but I decided that I would rather get to Bryce National Park. So, after leaving a thank you note from the Volt to the Prius, I left the hotel by 9 and headed down I-15 with a fully charged battery. Drove about 3 hours on the highway and then turned off on to route 20 and the route 89. Climbing most of the way. The route seemed vaguely familiar, but while we visited Bryce in the mid-90s, I think that we came from the south after visiting Zion, so I do not think I had previously driven on these roads. Stopped in Panguitch, a small town at the rest area and for gasoline.  Gas was expensive. As I continued to the park it began to rain, initially lightly and then heavily. I did not think that it rained here in the summer, let alone much at all, but for a while it was really coming down. I imagined walking around the park in my poncho. The last road was route 12 and it took about 4 hours to get there.

Before I got to the Park I entered Dixie National Forest. I stopped in Red Canyon. The rock formations were striking. There were lots of tall, colorful, spires and other fantastic forms of rocks that are called Hoodoos. These are part of the Claron Limestone Formation and are created by the repeated freezing and thawing. I learned that the red, yellow and brown colors came from iron oxides while manganese oxides create a lavender tone. I parked and took a short hike. Up, around and through the rocks. Also saw some bristlecone pines, but not as many as I had seen in the CA. forest. I ended up at the Visitors Center. It had some beautiful, but expensive paintings of the area. There are some hardy plants out there, including the bristlecone pines.

As I turned into what I thought would be the Park, I first entered Bryce Canyon City. A large collection of hotels and restaurants that were surprising to be found inside the Park, but convenient. I saw a sign warning that parking was limited in the Park and advised taking the shuttle. So, I parked in the satellite lot and after showing my senior pass and getting my map, I hurriedly boarded the shuttle. To my dismay the shuttle began a circuit of the hotels in the city before entering the park. I ate lunch on the shuttle from my accumulated collection of fruit and leftovers.

Studying the map while on the shuttle I realized that it only went about a quarter of the way into the Park.  Turned out not to be a problem since by now it was about 2:30 and there was a lot to see and do in what turned out to be the northern quarter of the Park.

I exited the shuttle after about 10 minutes in the park at stop #4, Bryce Point.  After short walk out to the point, I gazed out in amazement into a wild topography of shapes, forms and colors. Bryce is misnamed as a canyon. It really is a series of horseshoe shaped amphitheaters that have been carved into the edges of the Paunsaugunt Plateau by the tributaries of the Paria River. I thought that a comment I saw on a plaque by Mormon settler Ebenezer Bryce that was “a hell of a place to lose a cow”. The Native Americans’ name for the area translated to “red rocks standing like men in a bowl-shaped canyon.”

There are hiking trails that descent to the floor, but I opted for the Rim Trail. It was a relatively flat trail that wound its way along the amphitheater affording spectacular views of the rock formations. Even though the trail was largely at or above 8000 ft. I had not difficulty with it, but I did walk through some light rain. I took too many pictures and by the time I reached Inspiration Point my phone/camera was almost out of power, so I had to forgo many pictures.  Parts of this trail marked a water shed boundary between water that flowed ultimately into the Colorado River and water that flowed into the Great Basin. The latter has no outlet to the sea so all that water either is absorbed into the ground or evaporates. I walked about 2.3miles until Sunset Point.

I needed power in my phone to make a hotel reservation so, missing Sunrise Point and trails down to the floor, I left the trail at Sunset Point and caught a shuttle to the Bryce Canyon Lodge.  There, as I charged my phone I learned that the Lodge was built in the 1920s by the Union Pacific Railroad which was interested in stimulating tourism and competing with its competitors who were building Lodges in Yellowstone, Glacier and Grand Canyon Parks. The UP-tourist Park loop encompassed Bryce, Zion and the North rim of Grand Canyon Parks. It was designed by Gilbert Stanley Underwood who designed the Lodges in the parks mentioned above. Its lobby was smaller than those I saw in the other lodges, but it had a huge stone fireplace and it had a large brick porch that was equipped with lots of chairs and benches that I used while my phone charged. I purchased a long sleeve tee shirt on sale in the gift shop. By now it was after 5 and I decided that I did not want to drive too far, so I made a reservation at the Virgin River Hotel and Casino where I had stayed before, just across the state line in Mosquito, Nevada. The usual $27 hotel room on Booking.

I got back on the shuttle before some more rain and headed out of the Park at about 6:15. I decided to take what I thought was a scenic short cut to get back to I-15 on the road to Nevada so I took route 14 into the mountains. The road was scenic, but it was windy and many ups and downs. I got as high as 9900 ft. at Midway Summit and passed Duck Creek and stopped at Navajo Lake. By the time I emerged at Cedar City I had a scenic, but slower experience.

Driving on I-15 through Arizona I passed through Virgin River Gorge. This is a beautiful, spectacular stretch of road, but even at that late hour it was over 100 degrees. I got to the Virgin River casino hotel at what was 8:15 due to the time zone change, so I thought that I had some time to use the buffet that closed at 10. I got a first-floor room and after waiting for a lady to move her car from the front of my room, I tried to plug in my car, but came up about 1 ft. short.
After I was seated at the buffet I was told that I had only 20 minutes to eat because they were closing. Apparently, the buffet stayed on Mountain Time. Probably a blessing in disguise since it limited my eating, but I felt robbed of the benefit of the buffet.

November 6
Got up early and swam in the hotel outdoor pool. Even then it was in the80s. After the swim, I checked out the breakfast buffet. No one stooped me so I just sampled some eggs and ice cream, which I did to get to eat the prior night. I got out by 9:15 and stopped for gasoline at the same station we had stopped on the way up 8 days earlier. The tank read 416 miles and it was only 366 miles to LA so I tried to drive straight through. I had to stop to go to the bathroom in Barstow, CA. and while there I refilled my water bottles with ice. It was over 100 degrees all the way home until I got near to LA. When I got home I parked at a charging station and immediately headed to the ocean to immerse myself in the cool waters.  

To Minneapolois

June 3, 2019 Monday Day 16

My son went off to work and we belatedly left for Minneapolis at about 10 am. That required us to retrace our route back to Des Monies, windmills and rolling farmland, then 4 more hours to Minneapolis. We left with a full battery, 52 miles.

The trip up I-35 after Des Monies and to Minneapolis was pretty boring. Lots of flat farmland and no cites of any size.

We visited a friend for a barbecue dinner. Nice and tasty food. They have a beautiful house on a lake in a near west suburb. The house is very large. Nice and I am a bit envious, but I did my large house phase.

After the visit we descended upon our son for visit and bonding with 2.5 year old grandson whom we will take to Europe for family wedding celebration. Also checked in on the 6 month old grandson.

Back to Omaha, or Really Bellevue NE

June 1 and 2, 2019 Saturday and Sunday  Days 14 and 15

Saturday

We packed up in the morning and finally met our Airbnb host. Complimented her on her guest quarters and thanked her for the electricity that filled up the battery. So we took off for a return trip to Omaha/Bellevue with 53 miles. Driving westward on I-80 we gain saw the forest of very big windmills in the fame lands along the highway. A rest stop in Iowa had a big exhibit on renewable energy. There was a windmill blade there and it was very large. We had learned that these and the towers are now manufactured in Newton in a former Maytag facility. Iowa is the second largest producer of wind energy in the country. Yet there was no electric charging station at the rest stop.

We arrived in Omaha in the early afternoon. Lewis and Clark passed through this area in 1804. The Kansas Nebraska Act (which repealed the Missouri Compromise and set the country on an inevitable path to a civil war) spurred development and the city was founded in that same year by land speculators from across the river in Council Bluffs, IA. In 1859 it was the eastern terminus of the Pony Express and in 1862 it was designated as the eastern terminus of the trans-continental railroad. Construction by the Union Pacific began in 1863. There is a terrific railroad museum by the Union Pacific in Council Bluffs which tells the story of the westward expansion of the railroads in the US. It became a transportation hub and in the 20 century it had the largest stockyards and slaughter houses in the world. By the 1950s over half the workforce in Omaha was engaged in meat slaughtering, packing and processing.

The city has a stories history of labor and racial strife. As early as the 1890s there were several instances when the state militia or federal troops were called out to protect either striking workers or struck company's replacement workers. In 1891 a black railroad porter was lynched because he allegedly raped a white girl. And in 1919 while in the middle of that summer's Red riots, a mob burnt down the county courthouse to get at and lynch a Black man for allegedly having sex with a white woman. The mayor attempted to stop these proceedings, but he too was lynched, although he was saved for death.

The stockyards are now all gone along with the historic district along the riverfront, demolished at the insistence of ConAgra which wanted the land to build a new campus.

Fontenelle's Post was established in 1823 as a fur trading post in what became Bellevue. That city is now home to Offutt Air Force Base which was created during WWII. The Enola Gay was built at Offutt. It is now the largest employer in the metropolitan area. Fontenelle was a Chief of the Omaha tribe who signed treaties which ceded much of the land that eventually became Omaha to the federal government.

After meeting my son we went to Fontenelle Forest. That is essentially a private park, we got in via a military discount, which has preserved a large forested area along the Missouri River and also treats injured raptors. It keeps and displays the raptors who cannot recover sufficiently to return to the wild. We spent a few hours viewing the raptors and walking the trails through the Forest.

View from the Forest across the flooded Missouri River

The view across the Missouri River showed much flooded farmland.

We ate dinner at a burger joint, Stellas, and then watched a movie

Sunday

Walked around my son's neighborhood and then went out shopping. First we went looking for an electric lawn mower for my son. He has a large back yard and has been borrowing a neighbor's riding mower. We looked at several models in several warehouse stores, but realized that they would be on sale over the July 4th weekend, so the purchase was delayed (It was subsequently made.) Then we went to a T-Mobile store at my son's insistence to replace my 4.5 year old cellphone. My current one is still working but has very limited storage and the battery has degraded to the point that it does not hold a charge for a full day. Presto, problems solved with a new Google Pixel 3a.

We purchased some salmon and food for dinner and cooked at my son's home.

Des Moines 2

May 31, 2019 Friday Day 12

We a woke early and had breakfast in our  lodging from our store of food. Yogurt, fruit and muffins. The memorial service we had come to Des Moines to attend was scheduled for 10:00 at St. Augustine Church. a large building on the west side close to our Airbnb that we easily found. Dressed in our finery it was hot, but the cathedral offered shelter from the sun. the service was nice, but it was clear that the priest did not know the deceased, who while married in that church, had long ago moved away.n The service ended about 11:30 and we did not go to the graveside service. The reception began about noon. During the reception I spoke with several people who knew the deceased at various stages during her varied life including a stint living in Japan as a trailing spouse for an IBM executive. The very limited sample of people I spoke with had a mixed view of Trump. Many disliked his style, but supported what they perceived to be his policies on improving the economy, lowering taxes (they felt that businesses needed a tax break to create jobs) and eliminating regulations. They believed that he would win the trade war and that American agriculture would ultimately benefit, acknowledging that it was now being hurt by his actions.

We then took off for the Des Moines Art Center, an art museum that has won acclaim for its architecture. It is housed in builds partially designed by I M Pei that form a quadrangle around a reflecting pool. It has a lot of modern art and featured an exhibit of anti-fascist art by Lea Grundig. A Communist and a Jew, she created art in the 1930s in defiance of the Nazi's bans and ultimately ended up in a concentration camp. Surviving that and WWII she ultimately immigrated to Palestine.

Modern Art at the Center

We then headed to downtown Des Moines for a tour. It was surprisingly quiet there for Friday afternoon. The city's European history dates to the 17th century when initially French priests, explores and fur trappers ventured into the upper Midwest for French Canada, to be followed by a few colonial settlers. They largely left after the British conquered Canada and ownership of this area (I doubt that the Native Americans were consulted) was successively transferred to Spain, then back to France and finally sold to the US as part of the Louisiana Purchase. The city was originally named Fort Raccoon.for the river that joins the Des Moines River, but the War Department vetoed that and the new name was drawn from the French colonialists who referred to the area as Des Moines, from the Monks. It grew rapidly as a railroad hub in the late 19th century and as a manufacturing center in the 20th century as well as being the capital city of Iowa. It declined in the 1970s and 80s but has rebounded as an insurance center.

We parked downtown and walked down to the river. Like the Missouri, it too was flooded beyond its banks covering the balustrades, walkways and embankments built by the CCC.

The Civic Center Historic District has many government buildings that are over 100 years old and are imposing large stone structures. The sate Capital and City Hall were impressive and we took a quick tour of the State Historical Building. The downtown was getting ready for a Pride celebration and we stopped into a local store and purchased some hot sauce for our two Midwestern sons who enjoy that.

We then visited the Pappajohn Sculpture Garden. Many unusual shapes.

On the way back to our residence we food shopped and cooked dinner and ate on patio. A very pleasant experience.

Des Moines

May 30, 2019 Thursday -Saturday Day 12
My son is working the swing shift so he did not have to leave for work at the AF base until about 2:45. We went out for lunch at Chipolte. I could not eat an entire serving when I  used to be able to gobble it all up.There were many service members there. We then drove around Bellveue and down to the swollen Missouri River. The fields and parks on both sides of the river were flooded and showed no prospect of drying out soon. If this is representative there will be many Midwest farmers who will not be able to plant on time and probably will suffer serious financial harm.

Flooded Missouri River

About 2:45 pm we set out for Des Monies, along I-80 about a 2 hour trip. After we passed Council Bluffs, IA. on the east side of the river the land began to flatten out and was more agricultural. Very few trees, but lots of very large windmills. Before reaching Des Monies our only stop was for gasoline. We arrived in Des Monies about 4:45 and without any problem found our Airbnb, Forestdale Guest House, on the west side of town. I picked this place in part due to its proximity to the memorial services we would be attending tomorrow. It is a guest house attached to the rear of the main house with a large screened porch. It is in a very nice wooded residential neighborhood. Our host left an extension cord that I immediately used to begin to recharge the car's battery.

Des Monies Airbnb

After changing we drove out to Newton, former home of Maytag, for a barbecue. It was about a 45 minute drive east, so Newton is really not a bedroom suburb. The barbecue was at the home of our friend's brother, whose mother recently died. Nice residential neighborhood with well maintained medium to larger sized homes and well tended yards. The part of Newton which we drove through did not seem to be economically depressed.

Maytag was founded in Newton and had not only its corporate offices there, but also its primary production facility which had 3000 manufacturing jobs. In speaking with people at the barbecue, they felt that the last CEO of Maytag was brought in by the family owners to sell the business. He did that and it was sold to Whirlpool, which promised to retain the Maytag operations in Newton. That promise was not kept and when the entire operation was moved and all the Maytag facilities closed, these people felt that it had a devastating impact on the town. Some people left, others got retrained for mostly non-existent jobs, many went on welfare. The consensus of these people was that Newton had not fully recovered. I wonder if this is Trump country?

We met a retired couple (they did not look that old) at the barbecue who lived in Florida during the cold months and traveled around the west in an RV the rest of the year. They park the RV in various western cities when not using it, it is currently in Portland, and are convinced that is the best way to travel.

We drove back in the fading light of late evening, the daylight is getting much longer, and got back to our residence about 10:30.

Drive to Omaha Day 11

May 29, 2019 Wednesday Day 11

We a woke early and made our own big breakfast at the lodging. Packed up the car and got out by 9:30. After driving through Cheyenne directly to I-80, contrary to Google Maps directions to go out of the way west and south on I-25 to get to I-80, we headed east for the longest drive of the trip.

We had a 350 mile trip ahead of us to Omaha and a one hour time zone change so we did not have the opportunity to make stops in Nebraska if we were to get to my son's house before bedtime. The terrain  leaving Cheyenne continued to be wide open spaces with lots of bluffs and rolling hills. I-80 follows the Outlaw Trail scenic Byway through Nebraska. Initially not much farming, it seemed to be lots of ranches. I guess I was so engrossed in the landscape that I missed the welcome to Nebraska sign. We passed under the Archway spanning I-80 near Kearney. There were several Electrify America fast charging stations strategically located along the freeway, usually in Walmart parking lots, but the Volt is not equipped for that. This network is a product of Deasilgate and Volkswagen's penalty for its fraud.

We stopped in Gothenburg and toured a restored Pony Express station that was set in a pretty and very green park. These stations were set up every 12-15 miles and were basically just horse changing stations. The larger stations were about 90 miles apart and the riders changed at those sites. The riders made $25/week.

The volunteer was very knowledgeable and spent 30 minutes explaining its history. He claimed that for a long time Congress had been deadlocked over a charter for such a service between the north and south, each of whom wanted a route that began in its area. A similar dispute held up the authorization for a transcontinental telegraph line and railroad. All these projects were authorized and moved forward only after the southern representatives left Congress. The service sought , young, light weight and preferably orphans as riders. They wanted speed and riders whose deaths would not cause a stir. In fact only one rider died in service and that was in a snow storm in the Sierra Nevada Mts. The youngest rider was 11 and he lived to be 105 when he died in 1955 in NYC. Buffalo Bill also rode for the service. The service was never profitable. It was started by a group that was already losing money on a stage coach service and thought that it could get financially healthy with US mail contracts. It did not work out even thought the Express received those contracts and others from the government and delivered on its promise to deliver the mail within 10 days. $5 for a letter. It was purchased by Wells Fargo who shut it down after 19 months in operation, 2 days after the telegraph line became operational.

Pony Express station

The town seemed to be a picture postcard version of prosperous, small town, middle America. Mature trees lined its streets and covered nice sized and well maintained homes that were set back from the streets by large front yards. It had a two block commercial center that had no bordered up shops.

We ate dinner at the Nebraska Bar and Grill, in Gothenburg, a large barn like building. Terrific steaks, but way too much food. It had a single level 2 charging station that provided us with 16 miles of charge, as well as a multi port Tesla charging station.

We exited the interstate before Omaha and took some back roads through farm country to get to my son's house in Bellevue, which is south of Omaha. Those 30 minutes at the end of the drive were very dark. So we got to visit with son number 3 and  I got to charge up the car in his garage.