Today was a day several years in the making. I remember a couple of years ago, Tom Heffron mentioned that there was going to be an eclipse in 2017 that was going to pass right over our house in MO. In the meantime, we ended up selling that house, moving to south Texas, and finding out that the path of totality was going to be about 70 miles north of our old place! I decided that no matter what, I was going to be somewhere on the path of totality come Aug 21, 2017. We had several choices, starting with cousin John Lee in Oregon, the Pat Rafferty in Idaho, Judy's cousin Val in Wyoming, the kids in Columbia MO, or dad in Paducah KY. We started summer out with a trip to KY, MO, Iowa (camping farmer), and MT (Kelly), then on to Swift Current SK and Westcan7 mega geocache event. After just about more fun than I could handle, we spent a month in the Townsend area, helping people move and geocaching as well as staying cool. When Aug 21 got close, I contacted Pat who invited us out to the ranch for a few days to watch with some other friends of theirs. We had a grand time catching up with the Raffertys and then came the big day. The weather was perfect - not a cloud in the sky. We got my ETX set up to track the event, cameras to document the affair, and loads of beer and wine to keep us hydrated. As totality approached, cameras clicked, eclipse glasses tried out, and a hush settled over the small crowd of 8. At the moment of totality there was a collective WOW. The nearby horses looked at us like we were nuts but otherwise went about their usual business of grazing. We spent another evening enjoying Bear Paw Ranch hospitality, then said our goodbys and headed south once again. We stopped off in WY, UT, and NM for more geocaching and sight seeing which was all great but just didn't quite measure up to those few moments of totality in August. What a sight!By the way, there was nothing fancy about the picture. I took a number of shots through my ETX leading up to totality primarily to compare against that awesome annular eclipse from a few years ago in NM, but I decided to heed the advise of others who said to simply enjoy the view. At the last minute, after my WOWs were finished, I grabbed my nearby Canon POS, pointed it in the geneal direction of the sun, and snapped a picture using auto settings. As luck would have it, it turned out pretty good.
