Category Archives: Travel

April 12, 2024 · 23:50

Road Weather

Two days back home and this weekend I’m going to try to go through the eclipse photos and see what’s good. There’s got to be at least one or two, right? Statistical fluctuations and all of that!

In the meantime, because I like pictures of clouds and storms and potentially violent weather, enjoy these pictures from Tuesday on the trip from Kerrville to Tucson.

Here are some mammatus clouds. They’re supposed to be a sign of particularly violent weather, the boiling bottom of a big thunderhead cell. (These were, no “supposed to be” about it.)

This panoramic view of a freaking huge thunderstorm supercell should have been like Gandalf standing there, blocking the road, bellowing, “YOU SHALL NOT PASS!” I passed anyway.

As for the eclipse photos that I need to sort through and clean up, I suspect that the videos might be better than the still photos. Mistakes were made.

On the other hand, remember the T-shirt that I was wearing? (Picture here.) I may crop that a little, find a place that does custom T-shirts, and have this image of me printed on there with a caption that says, “Hello DORKness, My Old Friend!” I mean, if the shoe fits!

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Filed under Panorama, Paul, Photography, Travel, Weather

April 10, 2024 · 23:58

Eclipse Plus Day Two – Home

The plan was 20 hours of driving with about 26 hours on the road if you include gas stops, rest stops (old pharts NEVER pass up a rest stop), food stops, and so on. Yesterday I put in 12 hours of driving in about 16 hours on the road. All of that high quality mathematical education I got means that I figured today would be about 8 hours of driving in about 10 hours on the road.

You know what they say about plans and God?

There’s a LOT of this between there and here.

The 8 hours of driving was accurate, but it was far more like twelve hours on the road. Construction sites did me in. It also dominoed into a situation where I hit LA and environs right at the beginning of the evening rush hour instead of two hours earlier. Which in turn caused hours of delays. It’s a long way from the far edge of the “LA Area” to home on the far edge on the other side. There are smaller states. Literally. And when the freeway I’ve already picked has a huge accident that closes all lanes…

Thank goodness the two bozos who tried to sideswipe and rear-end me both missed. (Hissy is small and zippy and strong and nimble!)

The other odd thing happened in Phoenix, where the GPS started malfunctioning and showing us off the freeway by a couple hundred yards. Was someone testing a jammer or blocking device?

Whatever.

It is good to be home. It will be good to be back in my own bed. And it is wonderful to be back working on my desktop systems with big, dual monitors, full-sized keyboards, and all of the other trappings of civilization!

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Filed under Photography, Travel

April 9, 2024 · 22:37

Eclipse Plus One Day

Back to the “real world,” which lives somewhere on the far side of about 20 hours of driving, which means about 28 hours of traveling. Out in three days to make sure I arrived relatively rested and had a lot of slack in the schedule should anything go sideways. Back in two days – because it can be done, I need to get it done, and there’s plenty of time to sleep when I’m dead! 😵

There was weather! Small hail, BIIIIIIG thunder & lightning, moderate deluges here and there.

So tonight is my last on this toad trip. I should be back home about dinner time tomorrow. That’s a good thing.

While it was important for me to prove to myself that I can still pull off this kind of trip, I would be big time lying if I said it was as easy as it was 20 years ago.

Tonight I have managed to find the most bizarre, trendy, artsy fartsy, fru-fru, potentially horrible little Marriott spinoff hotel in the world! I have eaten “yucca fries,” whatever they are.

It’s another adventure! An unexpected side quest!

It will be excellent!

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Filed under Photography, Travel, Weather

April 8, 2024 · 19:45

The Dark Side Of The Moon – Literally

What a roller coaster ride!

When I got up this morning it was mostly cloudy, with low clouds and fog, but the Sun occasionally popping out for a second or two.

We stuck with our plan and stayed in Kerrville, going down to the local park where there was a huge eclipse program planned, open for free to the public. The skies continued to improve.

Up until about thirty minutes before totality, well over halfway through the partial phases, it was plenty clear enough to see the Sun.

Excitement levels were high. We got a talk by NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman, who is the commander of the Artemis II mission to the Moon.

At about T-0:30, a band of low level, thick clouds moved in. We couldn’t see squat. Excitement had turned into despair.

Less than thirty seconds before totality, a brilliant sliver of sunlight appeared almost directly overhead, a crescent 🌙 of light that announced the end of the partial phase.

The crescent shrank over the next 30 seconds, then vanished as the “diamond ring” effect was visible. Our surroundings became completely dark, the temperature had dropped 10°F or more,

The corona appeared in all of its glory. The crowd went berserk.

It was spectacular!

We had 4:32 of totality, but the fortuitous hole in the clouds closed up tight. We saw nothing more of totality. Our surroundings stayed dark, the frogs started croaking, the ducks flew back home, and we could watch “sunrise” rush at us at Mach Two from the south.

After totality ended, it continued to be cloudy and cool. We stayed and enjoyed the festival for another couple of hours before walking the two miles back to my hotel.

We needed a break and got it.

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Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Travel

April 7, 2024 · 21:27

Eclipse Minus Twelve Hours

Look at this gorgeous sunset from San Antonio tonight!

It’s not quite “clear and a million,” but it would do for tomorrow.

Totality in Kerrville starts at 13:32 CDT. There’s mow a 77% chance of “clouds” then, but that could mean something like this (which would be FINE) to heavy, thick, low rain clouds (which would NOT be).

It will be what it will be. But if any of the gods are listening and could deign to cut us some slack, we’ll take it.

“Some days it’s better to be lucky than good!” I’ve been good – now I’ll graciously accept some good luck.

Clear skies, eclipse buckaroos!!

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Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Space, Sunsets, Travel, Weather

April 6, 2024 · 19:57

Eclipse Minus One Day

Our forty-hour forecast is for an 82% chance of clouds. (It was 84% two hours ago, so… yeah?) But they don’t say if that means heavy, low, thick clouds or high, thin clouds.

It will be what it will be. We had discussed alternative plans if anything “nearby” looked promising. At this point, everything from Mexico to Ohio looks lousy. So we will sit tight and hope for the best.

Today however, was a different adventure. Four hours south of San Antonio, on the coast…

Here there be rockets!!! 🚀

Boca Chica, where SpaceX Starships and Superheavy boosters launch.

They’re setting up now for their third full test flight.

The “rocket garden” with three old Starship rockets, including the booster that was the first to fly and land successfully.

We may or may not get clouded out on Monday, but this was a spectacular way to spend the day!

It’s an adventure! It’s fantastic!

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Filed under Photography, Space, Travel

April 5, 2024 · 23:23

Eclipse Minus Two Days

As the prophecy foretold…

A) Here come the clouds.

The more detailed and precise cloud cover forecasts start on Saturday, but the short version as of now is we may be SOL all the way from the Mexican border to Ohio. We shall see.

B) This may be the night the site publishing streak ends. It’s almost 01:30 here in Texas, but still only 23:30 at my home in California. Which clock is the WordPress computer looking at when it decides to hand out Brownie points? I can hope, but I’m pretty sure I know.

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April 4, 2024 · 21:28

Eclipse Minus Three Days

Today was a second long day of driving. And two time zone changes, so suddenly I’ve lost two hours.

There are many, many pictures of really neat things that will require longer posts later. Then there was the legendary experience of trying to get dinner at 21:30 on a Thursday night in Fort Stockton, Texas…

Tomorrow I’ll be in Kerrville, I’ll meet up with my son, and we’ll start plotting the weekend and doomscrolling about cloud cover and weather forecasts.

It’s an amazing adventure!!

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April 3, 2024 · 22:14

Eclipse Minus Four Days

First off, as a side note, I’m currently on a consecutive days posting streak here of 786 days.

I give that streak a 50/50 chance at best of making it to 800 days at the end of next week. What will kill it, accidentally, will be A) a horribly long day of driving and adventuring at which point I get back to the hotel and crash and burn and sleep for 12 hours, B) not knowing what time zone I’m in to begin with and having midnight click by when I think it’s still 22:00 or 23:00, or C) both.

Eleven hours on the road today to do 8.5 hours of driving. That leaves a little less than 11 hours of driving remaining to get to Kerrville, TX on Friday.

Arizona rest stops have issues.

Are scorpions actually classified as insects? Who knew?

I did not see any, but there are a lot of tall cacti on those hills. I did not get any closer because, well, jeeze Louise, SEE ABOVE!

I did see this guy (and a small flock of his family & friends) who were sounding off just before sunset at the rest stop.

The Cornell Labs ID’d it as a great-tailed grackle. (I think I messed up the title on the Youtube upload. My bad!) That’s a new one for me!

Tonight I’m back in Benson, AZ for the night. (Cue all of the appropriate “Dark Star” 🚀👽🛸 jokes.) Tomorrow it’s on to Texas (4 hours, 271 miles to El Paso) and we’ll see where I end up for the night.

It’s an adventure! It’s awesome!!😎

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Filed under Birds, Critters, Photography, Travel

April 2, 2024 · 22:53

Eclipse Minus Five Days

Ready or not…

Tomorrow, the road to Texas awaits. Get to the I-10 and turn left – if you hit Houston you’ve gone too far.

The good news is that the five-day forecast for clouds is improving a bit for Central Texas. It’s not good, mind you, but it’s better. I don’t necessarily need “clear and a million” (although I would of course take it) but I would certainly like something better than what I had seven years ago. Like, a lot better.

We will see. It will be what it will be.

Am I ready? Probably more ready than I was afraid I would be, but never as ready as I would like. It’s like that line about novels or other projects, they’re never “done,” they just get to the point where they’re “abandoned.”

It’s gonna be an adventure! It’s gonna be spectacular!

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