Terry and I arrived home (well her home anyway) to Valley View around dinnertime yesterday, after a truly wonderful trip - and with enough 'adventures' to make it truly memorable.  Granddaughter Ivy (who had been staying here 'helping' her parents help Steve care for Neil in our absence) was really quite happy despite the momentary look I caught on 'film'.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 19

We had managed to get on the road around 11:00, and hadn't even made it the 8 miles to the highway before we found our first picture-worthy event: three great horned owls in a tree alongside Road GG.  

Then right before we got to the highway, we looked for the little burrowing owls (last summer they had been living near Elinor and Richard's a mile or so away, but this summer had moved to new digs <g>) and sure enough one little guy was visible just behind the fence for my viewing pleasure.

In Leadville we stopped for a number of things.  After a quick stop at the bank ATM (cash is always handy) we walked across the street and down one block in search of a 'second' quilt store (Tom and I had checked out the 'first' one a couple of years ago) and passed this sign.

What business was it?

The address we had for the quilt store is some other business now, which was too bad, because the blurb on the 'net had mentioned original Colorado mountain designs. I had been looking forward to checking those out (and 'possibly' <g> making a purchase.)  However, we drowned our sorrows by buying some goodies at the bakery next door, where it's always Cookie O'clock.

We popped into this art store, which had some lovely things - and lots of work space for the classes they held.  Of course I had to try out the penguin seat!

There were a number of quilts on display; I liked this little hummer.

We had no trouble finding the famous taco truck in the Safeway parking lot, and the food was as good as all the rave reviews had promised.  While we waited for our lunch at the picnic table we chatted with some local men doing the same, and I continued to enjoy the ever-changing cloud formations.

Driving into Walden we were mesmerized by two birds performing a flying dance.  They would flap and soar in unison, dipping and turning in tandem.  It was synchronized beautifully, and lovely to watch.  I am not skilled at identifying birds (like Terry and her sisters) but "everyone" decided later they were pelicans.

Here is Walden's welcome sign, with their claim to fame:

Our first order of business was to check in.  There was a temporary "back in 15 minutes" sign on the door, and this permanent sign:

While there was no lovable lab around when we checked in, it turned out that another dog (and its person) had been staying in 'our' room, and they had decided to stay on a couple of weeks longer.  So they wouldn't have to move, we got up-graded to a 2-bedroom house (for the original price.)  No complaints there!  It was comfy, and instead of sharing a motel bed as we'd expected we each had a bedroom.

Neither of us was hungry yet after our delicious and filling lunch in Leadville, so we headed out to the wildlife refuge a few miles out of town to look for moose. We saw zillions of water birds, and it was a pretty loop drive, but sadly never spotted any moose.  The sun was quite low in the sky, and at one point I tried out the eclipse glasses.  They were perfect for viewing the setting sun - but nothing else.  I enjoyed seeing all the pelicans, and these 3 were close enough to get some good shots!

We had big salads for a late dinner at the "nice" hotel,

and then retired for the night at our cozy bungalow.

SUNDAY, AUGUST 20

It was a leisurely morning (glad Terry got a good night's sleep; Neil wakes her up most nights) and we put a few miles on the car before stopping in Saratoga for breakfast.

Lollypops said Café out front, but when we walked in it looked like it was just ice cream and coffee. When I asked about 'eggs and hash browns', the young woman at the counter said they did serve eggs, but for hash browns we'd have to go somewhere else.  However when she showed us a menu it listed eggs, pancakes, French Toast, etc... but home fries instead of hash browns.  Guess I should have just said potatoes? LOL! We stayed, and enjoyed a delicious breakfast.

There was a lot of artwork displayed inside; this holiday tree was created by an art class utilizing various art materials: paint tubes, paint brushes, crayons, pipe cleaners, etc.  When I was taking its picture, there was a couple sitting at the table right next to it, and the man said we should see what the Sex Ed class has created.

I hadn't noticed this ice cream cone right inside the door when we walked in...

Though we still had 3/4 of a tank, we decided it would be wise to keep filling up every time we could after hearing reports of no gas in towns close to the line of totality. 

However there were only two choices: diesel, and regular.  My car, a turbo, requires premium, so I hoped that mixing a little regular wouldn't do irreparable harm.  Luckily the next town did have premium, and we topped off again.  I just hoped that there was enough premium to dilute the regular and keep my engine happy - and it seemed to be!

As we were heading out of town, 2 stags crossed Main St. right in front of us. This shot was taken through through the front window.

We followed the 2 of them, and with my window open I got much clearer shots.

They seemed to have a routine, heading down this side street

and then back across Main St.

to check out another yard.

We missed the shortcut into Casper (more on that later) but there was no traffic to speak of.  Despite the directions we had, which made the field north of town sound quite remote and difficult to find, we drove right to it with no trouble.  It was on top of the world, with a 360-degree view.  The downside was that it was full of cactus (and quite a few prairie dog holes) though Janel's mother was out there with a shovel trying to clear a path for cars.

As the first ones there we had our choice of spots, and picked one that was large enough for the tent and looked cactus free.  It was rather windy, so laying out the tarp wasn't easy, even with all the stuff we had to hold down the edges.  I was smoothing down the tarp when a whole bunch of cactus spines poked through.  So we dug those out, and then got some additional layers from my car (an old shower curtain I keep in there for a ground cloth for changing a tire, and the funky quilt for picnics, etc.) and then eventually got the tent staked down in the wind. Next we needed the poles.... which were MIA.  Terry hadn't used the tent in a few years, and was kicking herself for not setting it up before we left to make sure it had everything we needed.  After we both looked everywhere they could/should be, we eventually decided that we needed to drive back into town and see if we could find a tent for sale. So much for getting there mid-afternoon to get set up early and then kick back and relax.

The Wal-Mart parking lot was a ZOO.  People had tents set up in parking spots, hammocks were strung between trees, shade shelters were up next to cars.

We were really worried that the shelves of camping gear would be devoid of what we needed, but we actually had our choice of two different tents in our size (we certainly didn't want the 14-person tent, or the kiddie one for inside a house), and found a heavy-duty tarp to boot. 

We drove back to our field, and started taking up the staked tent and all the layers underneath it. 

And guess what we found?

The bag with poles had been one of the things we had laid out to try to hold everything down in the wind.  Tom's comment when I texted him what had happened: The 3 Stooges Go Camping.  (I replied that there were only 2 of us....)

Despite the Wyoming wind we got the tent set up without too much further difficulty, had our dinner, and were getting ready for dessert when Elinor and Richard arrived. 

A short while later a true wind storm arrived.  It was INTENSE (general consensus was that it could have reached 50 mph) and it took all we had to keep the tent and rain fly from leaving us.  Luckily it blew through in less than 10 minutes (though that's a long time to be sand-blasted.) While a lot of things had blown over and around, the only casualty (besides dirt everywhere) seemed to be my dash mat. I'd never taped down and with the car windows open it had flown away.  I figured it was in the next state (or certainly the next county) but Terry insisted we go search for it.  I'm amazed that we actually found it (did scare off some of the nearby antelope) and it was in one piece, though it had collected a fair amount of cactus spines as it had tumbled across the ground.  Another casualty was Terry's eclipse shirt, which she snagged on the barbed wire as we snuck through the gate.

After all that excitement it definitely was time to reward myself with dessert: the angel food cake I had grabbed when we were grocery shopping in Leadville.  None of the others were hungry, so I lifted the lid and pulled chunks from what is actually the bottom.  (Did comment that when I served it 'for company' the next day during the eclipse, once I flipped it over and set it on a plate it should look pristine and untouched.)

That night we played Euchre in the camper. (Terry had bought cards at one of our gas stops 'just in case' we got caught in one of the predicted traffic jams and needed a diversion.) I'd never played before, but the rules seemed easy enough, and Elinor was willing to be my partner.  I apparently did quite well for a first-timer, but Richard kept getting stellar hands, and a couple of times 'went it alone' and did make all the tricks.

It was still quite windy when we turned in for the night, and the rain fly was beyond flappy.  Elinor told us the next morning that she could hear us giggling from their trailer (I also had a fight with my sheet) but we both got a good night's sleep. 

MONDAY, AUGUST 21 - ECLIPSE DAY!!!!!

We woke up to clear blue skies, and no additional campers had arrived (for various reasons) so we ended up having that field as a private campsite for our group of 8. After coffee, Richard got to work setting up some shade for everyone. 

Karen & Mark, Rosemary, and Peg arrived (from their motel in a small town 40 miles north of Casper) a little before ten, well in advance of the 10:22 First Contact.  They had actually stopped by the day before (just to make sure they could find the field from the directions), and had seen the tent staked out on the ground; we and the car were nowhere in sight because that was when we were making the Walmart tent run.

Terry and her sisters are all avid bird watchers, and were enthralled by all the birds we saw: a golden eagle, 2 American bald eagles, and many varieties of hawks, including a juvenile Swainson that hung out near us during the eclipse.

Here I am, all dressed for the big event!

Terry and I donned our glasses in preparation.

The 3 sisters (Karen, Terry, Elinor) shortly after First Contact.

Mark was our 'resident' expert. He and Karen had traveled to Turkey for one eclipse, and Madagascar for another. (They had to miss the one that Neil went to in Mexico because of work.)

Mark has a great t-shirt collection, and I was looking forward to see what he had selected to wear for the eclipse.  The moon, of course!

Here he is explaining what to expect during the various phases,

and answering some of our questions.

During the time we were watching the moon slowly block out more and more of the sun, I brought out the angel food cake, flipped and looking quite lovely on a pretty blue plate. Someone said something about how nice it looked, and the four of us from the night before cracked up. Of course the other four wanted to know what was so funny.

One article in the NYT eclipse supplement had predicted that while most people would watch the 90 minutes from First Contact to Totality, they wouldn't watch the last 90 minutes. But I did. The entire 3-hour experience was incredibly AWESOME!

It was surprising to me that it stayed daylight until totality.  I expected it would get more like dusk and twilight as the eclipse progressed, thought the NYT supplement did mention that even with 90% coverage the sunlight would only be diminished by 10%. Obviously they were right! What we did experience was a noticeable drop in temperature as we neared Totality. 

The two minutes of Totality passed much more quickly than any of us would have liked. Though spellbound, I did think to take a picture. But it didn't turn out anything like what I actually saw, a blue ring around a black disc. Luckily, NASA's picture turned out much better!

I saw what NASA saw:

But this is what my camera captured - which was NOT what I actually saw!

I'm looking forward to seeing the pix that Peg got

with her nice camera and special filters for just such an event.

Of course everyone was taking pictures, and I'm looking forward to everyone sharing theirs.

In the meantime, here are some prairie dog skulls and bones Peg collected from our field.

Monday just happened to be Elinor and Richard's 35th anniversary.

What a great way to celebrate it!

The 4 traveling in Peg's car were headed to Yellowstone, and left as soon as the last phase ended a little after 1:00. Terry and I still had to break camp, but we got away around 2:00. Our hope was to put a lot of miles between us and Casper, making Tuesday's drive home short(er), while Elinor and Richard were going to stay another night in hopes that the traffic would clear up some.

Our first mistake was taking the 'Shortcut' we had missed on the way there.  The drive up and over mountain was pretty spectacular, giving us an incredible view of Casper. However, once over the top and past the ski area it soon turned into a washboard dirt road - which circled around for miles and miles, up and down, and was much longer than the rather straight line on the map.  But it was pretty country, and we did eventually find pavement again.  We sailed along for a few minutes. And then we came to a standstill.  Stop (for 5-10 minutes) and then crawl (for a few hundred feet). Took us over four hours to get the100 miles from Casper to Medicine Bow.

In the meantime, cell service was non-existent most of the time, and when we did get through, none of the motels in any of the towns we might make it to before midnight had rooms. A couple of the folks at the other end of the phone actually laughed when we inquired about a vacancy. Terry even tried some of the larger cities on I-80, like Rawlins (miles out of our way, but we were getting desperate) and it was the same thing: no vacancies.

By the time we got to Saratoga at 8:00 we stopped at one of the motels we hadn't yet reached by phone, and while they didn't have any vacancies, she did think that Copperline might.  I immediately called and asked if they had any rooms left.  When Dan said he did, I practically screamed, "I'll take it!" And then added, "I'm in love!".  He laughed, then asked where we were.  It was only a few blocks away (driving there we passed two tiny fawns - with no Mama in sight), Dan's directions were wonderful, and at that point of course (Terry had thought we might just have to drive all the way home, through the night) we didn't care what kind of room it was, or what it cost.  There just weren't towns/options until farther south. Walden, at least another hour from there (and where we stayed Saturday) was also booked. Copperline turned out to be past "rustic" (beyond the fact that it had no TV or A/C, one bed, a micro bathroom/shower, etc.) But it saved us driving 300 miles, which was sounding more and more like a 'plan',and we were thrilled to be there. 

We both felt better after a shower, and again got a good night's sleep!

TUESDAY, AUGUST 22

We drove to Walden for breakfast where we finally saw a moose -

at the Moose Creek Café.

It was pretty packed (we had seen a lot of cars outside) and we ended up sharing a 6-top with Todd, who was also on his way home from the eclipse.  Service was slow, but the waitresses were certainly zooming around so it was understandable.  The food was excellent when we eventually got it, but the truly amazing thing was that there was NO line for the ladies room (which was a single) - but there was a line outside the men's room (which turned out to accommodate 2 men!)  These 3 were in line when I went in - and 4 different men were in line when I came out!

We had seen dog Parker on the front porch when we went in, and after breakfast Terry had gone out to the car while I used the bathroom.  She said that Parker's "parents" took a picture of him with his head through the moose tourist cut-out photo-op prop.  'Dad' was holding him up, while 'Mom' had Parker's undivided attention with bacon while snapping the pic.  Would have loved to have seen that!

At one gas stop, I was headed in to go to the bathroom.  There was a teenager pushing and pushing on the front door until his friend said, "Dude - it says Pull!  And indeed it did, in rather large letters...

We did stop at the taco truck in the parking lot in Leadville to pick up dinner (and I couldn't resist getting another burrito for a late lunch) and then we were back on the road.

When we'd approached Silverthorne on the way up, Terry had told me about an osprey nest up on a no-longer-used electric pole. She'd heard that once a housing development went in the pole/nest had been removed, which was sad.  But it turned out to be a false rumor; when we drove by, there was the pole, and the nest - and an osprey!  So on the drive back I asked her drive by slowly so I could get a pic.  Unfortunately the occupant was elsewhere at the time and nobody seemed home.

In Buena Vista we stopped in at a quilt store (took a little doing to find it since the address said one street but it was actually on a different one) where I bought an owl panel and a book of dog/cat quilt patterns.  Terry popped into the grocery store for a few items while I waited in the car - and Tom called.  We found room for the groceries (not as easy as it sounds!), gassed up, and headed back.  No burrowing owls out and about on Road GG, but one great horned owl in that same tree.

We arrived home tired but happy.  We only unpacked the essentials - all the camping gear is still in there - and had a typical evening here.  I did load all the pictures from the trip, and we did enjoy looking at them, though I waited until this morning to write up my blog.  There has been no internet, but that shouldn't have interfered with me writing anything.  However my computer kept crashing, and it took a lot longer than it should have.  At this point I think I'll just try to post, and not worry about editing typos, etc.  

IT WAS A WONDERFUL TRIP!!!