We are pulling our space-&-science-loving 5th grader and our willing-to-go-with-the-flow 3rd grader to drive 6 hours to see totality. They’ll miss two days of school, but we hope to be back in time for their afternoon activities on Tuesday.

For our 5th grader, the appeal is obvious but we’re hoping the rareness and the spectacle of it will be worth it to us all.

No, I would not take my kid out of school for this. The one several years ago was such a letdown! So glad we just happened to be in a location where it was happening and did not make any extra arrangements for it.

For those traveling by car to totality the day of, make sure you leave super early. For the 2017 eclipse there were major traffic jams in some places with cars trying to get into the totality zone in time.

Anonymous wrote:Can I be honest on this anonymous forum and say I totally don't get it. I see so many people saying it is awe inspiring, amazing, gives goosebumps so I believe them of course but totally don't understand why it is so cool to be in the dark for three minutes. What am I missing?

We went to the eclipse in 2017 (turned it into a long-weekend visit to Nashville). We're pulling the kids (high schoolers) for the Monday this April. We're planning to visit my wife's parents, who live in the totality band.

For me it was a mix of natural and unnatural. It's natural in the sense that everything going around the sun is casting a shadow all the time. Who even thinks about that or cares, right. And then every now and then (there are predictable patterns) things line up, and the moon between sun and earth pulls this total solar eclipse thing somewhere on the planet. The whole event was a fun experience (the buildup, the funny tiny crescent suns amid shadows, the fast-moving shadow as totality began, the beads, the corona), but for me totality was amazing, humbling even. It wasn't just "be[ing] in the dark for three minutes." It was like the sun went out. Turned off. The sun/moon thing in the sky didn't just look dark. To me, it looked like a deep well, a deep hole in the sky. Something that *really* shouldn't be there. Something unnatural and freakish. It made me think and feel for a few minutes, in a way nothing else has, that yes, I am really standing here on a planet moving around in space with other giant objects doing similar things. It made me thing about the ancients experiencing this in their time, without knowledge the simple explanation behind it all.

I'm doing this with my first grader. We are pulling him out of school for a couple days and driving to Cleveland, which is in the path of totality.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can I be honest on this anonymous forum and say I totally don't get it. I see so many people saying it is awe inspiring, amazing, gives goosebumps so I believe them of course but totally don't understand why it is so cool to be in the dark for three minutes. What am I missing?

What do you find cool?

Getting Botox

Anonymous wrote:Can I be honest on this anonymous forum and say I totally don't get it. I see so many people saying it is awe inspiring, amazing, gives goosebumps so I believe them of course but totally don't understand why it is so cool to be in the dark for three minutes. What am I missing?

What do you find cool?

For those questioning why? It's a very interesting scientific event. Seeing the moon slowly move across the sky and block out part of the sun is amazing. You are not in total darkness as the moon can only block out the center part of the sun and so it is more like dusk light-wise. With the proper shielded glasses, it's a very interesting effect to see.

The effects as the eclipse progresses will look like:


And if you are in the path of totality the final effect (which should last 2-4 min depending on where you view it) will look similar to these:




As for where to see it, there is an interactive map here where you can look for places to go to see it.
https://eclipse2024.org/eclipse_cities/statemap.html

You want to be between the orange lines and as close to the blue line as you can get. Anywhere inside the orange lines will see totality and anywhere along the blue line will have the longest periods of totality. If you are outside the orange lines but close, you will see partial totality (where the moon only covers part of the sun and you will get a view more like the progress images from the first image.

We stayed locally for the last eclipse in 2017 and got a partial eclipse. It was interesting, but not as full of an effect as my friends who traveled. I want my kids to see full eclipse this time since they will be adults when the next one happens and I want us to enjoy this as a family.

My kids are adults now and I regret not pulling them out of school to travel more. In high school it's tough but any grade before that, do it.

Anonymous wrote:I don't even know where and when I can see solar eclipse. Location is rockville, MD.

It will have a path in the US from roughly Dallas through Cleveland, OH so picture that. I’m sure if you Google it you can get more info.

Anonymous wrote:I don't even know where and when I can see solar eclipse. Location is rockville, MD.

I don't even know where and when I can see solar eclipse. Location is rockville, MD.

Big deal you people need to get some serious life experiences

I live about an hour from the path and everyone I know is going to go drive down and see it with their kids.

Anonymous wrote:Can I be honest on this anonymous forum and say I totally don't get it. I see so many people saying it is awe inspiring, amazing, gives goosebumps so I believe them of course but totally don't understand why it is so cool to be in the dark for three minutes. What am I missing?

Totality is very different than "being in the dark". It's not dark, more like dusk, for one thing. Some of the cool things are the pinhole effects and the shadow bands. The insects and bird behavior is also unusual.

https://www.solareclipsetimer.com/the-cool-phenomena.html