Road Trip 1st Leg - Eclipse Hunting

We did a really fun road trip and I'm just getting around to sharing it with you! Yep, I'm a little behind...!

Dave really really wanted to find the perfect spot to watch the eclipse that took place 8/21, after much research and calling to find available campgrounds we ended up in Kearney, Nebraska. Al and Cathy drove separately and met us there - we planned to continue on after the eclipse but they had to go back home. Normally I wouldn't have loved our campsite, very flat with few trees and nothing else to do there - but this time it worked in our favor. Couldn't have asked for a better place to set up and watch the eclipse! We were super happy about that...but then we saw the weather reports predicted for the 21st and you're not going to believe it but right where we were they were predicting clouds and rain. In the entire path of the eclipse we chose the one spot it was expected to rain! Good grief. There was much discussion about driving a couple hours away that morning to hope for better weather but in the end we decided to stay put and see what happened. I'm pleased to say we had PERFECT weather (other than it was smoking hot there) - no clouds, no rain, and we were able to see 100% totality! So cool! Dave got some great pictures:

do you know how hard it is to take a selfie wearing solar eclipse glasses? with them on it's completely black, you can't see a thing! so we had to all look at the camera, I held my finger over the button and then put the glasses on without moving, and hoped for the best hahaha!! 

this is how dark the area was during the total eclipse

here's our campground - there weren't even masses of people around watching the eclipse,
we got lucky.  afterwards we heard other areas were packed and no one could move. 

I was using the umbrella for shade while watching the eclipse - Cathy took this picture and
questioned my "effective use of an umbrella" since I wasn't actually covering anything hahaha! 

Al and Cathy stayed in a local motel - our tiny RV can only sleep 2 and for some reason they didn't want to tent it haha - but they hung with us at the campsite playing games and chilling, and we grilled out for dinners. One night was the chicken sausage, pre-boiled pasta, red sauce that I've posted before (click here), the other night Dave grilled marinated chicken and we made 4 individual foil packets of sliced potatoes and onions, topped with a dab of butter and s/p (wrap up tight, throw on our little gas grill, cooked until potatoes were done)...why does everything taste better if cooked outside? This was delicious! They left first thing Tuesday morning for home, while we headed west to see some more of the country...will fill you in on that tomorrow!


one year ago today: junkin' with Candy led me to update this canister/wood thing...