Our Solar Eclipse Adventure

Next item on our summer bucket list: WATCH A SOLAR ECLIPSE!!!

Joy wanted to to take a nine-hour road trip south to see the total eclipse, but her practical parents vetoed that plan.  I still wanted the kids to see the partial eclipse in a fun and memorable way, though, and my first order of business was to make sure we could view it safely.  The Sun would be about 80% eclipsed in our area, which is still too bright to look at with the naked eye, but I learned that the National Air and Space Museum was giving away free eclipse-viewing glasses, so the kids and I set a course for it this morning.

Hundreds of other people apparently had the same idea, because before we even exited the freeway we found ourselves in bumper-to-bumper traffic.  As we slowly approached the museum's front gate I worried we wouldn't even be able to find parking, so when Joy pointed out that some people were parking by the side of the road and walking I decided to do likewise and hike the last half mile . . .

. . . to the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy branch of the National Air and Space Museum.  We obtained our eclipse glasses (good thing we arrived early--the supply was exhausted an hour later), then spent a little time viewing the museum's planes.

The historic planes were cool and all . . .

. . . but we were really blown away by the natural wonder of the solar eclipse.  The weather was partly cloudy, and every time the crescent Sun would emerge form behind a cloud, the growing crowd would ooh and aah over it.  No matter how many times we looked at it, the sight always felt like a treat.

It took over an hour for the eclipse to progress from beginning to maximum coverage, so we ate our lunch in the shade and occasionally stopped to catch a glimpse of the incredible shrinking Sun.  At 2:41 the eclipse reached maximum coverage for our area.  We savored the moment, then at 2:42 I started shepherding the kids back to our van so we wouldn't get caught in traffic again.

When we reached our van, the mostly-eclipsed Sun ducked behind a thin layer of cloud and I was able to get a photograph of it.  Then we drove home, right through a rainstorm.  I was so grateful that we had the chance to view the eclipse in an area with just a few little clouds overhead.  Joy is already looking forward to the next eclipse in 2024.