There was a total eclipse of the sun today, Monday April 8, and Kate and I tried to take advantage of it.
There was a partial eclipse a few years ago (2017) that we remember and we both have vague memories of similar partial eclipse's from our early childhod years. Kate had read quite a bit about this event and the importance of seeing the totality — it goes completely dark like night-time and you can actually see the stars (if it is clear of course). The position of the moon for this eclipse was such that it would cover the sun exactly right — not too big, not too small. Here in St. Marys they were to see 99% coverage where it would be more like a twilight — not completely dark. So we made plans to go to Niagara Region with friends, Erich and Lisa, who live in Burlington. We stayed overnight with them on Sunday and drove together for the day.
In Burlington they would be closer to the totality but still at the edge. Niagara Region (Niagara on the Lake, Niagara Falls, Buffalo, etc.) would be right in the totality and we wanted that experience. It turns out that Burlington is about an hour from the Niagara Region (an hour going there and much, much longer returning). We might have instead drove directly from here; if we had that would be about a two and a half hour drive. But, we were worried that there might be a big traffic snarl getting there. There was a "state of emergency" declared for the region in anticipation of a large turnout — I recall forecasts that a million people would be there! Staying overnight with friends nearby seemed like a better plan.
Our friends, Lisa and Erich, have a lovely home with a view of the Hamilton Harbor and the steel plants on the other side. Overnight the view is sometimes a bit like Dante's Inferno with flames and steam lighting the sky. Monday morning arrived with a heavy cloud cover. Many of our friends in SW Ontario had a similar morning experience. It did not bode well for any of us.
Erich is an old friend of mine — we were both computer science students at Western and lived together for several years in what Mike called "The Horbinger Home". We had lost touch but we re-connected just before the pandemic. There's a gang of us from those many years ago who share stories over a video conference call every couple of weeks. Erich is a jolly likeable guy, always joking — it would be hard not to like him. Erich and Lisa are quite social and kind to have us to their home for this and other events. We do enjoy our time together.
We had made reservations to see the eclipse at
"Between the Lines Winery" starting at 2:00 and had lunch at a nearby restaurant
"Bricks and Barley" in Virgil recommended by the winery. Both are a very short distance from Niagara on the Lake (a quaint Victorian contrast to the hub-bub, casinos, and carnival atmosphere of Niagara Falls). We had looked at staying in Niagara Falls, we had been there last year for my birthday, but the prices had sky rocketed knowing that there were many who wanted to be part of the event.
Getting to Niagara was no problem at all but the skies remained overcast. We arrived well before the restaurant opened, spent some time exploring an antique shop in Virgil and had a drive through Niagara on the Lake before returning for our lunch. You could see in Niagara on the Lake that there were a lot of visitors there for the eclipse. The parks were busy, people were getting set up to catch the eclipse, and there wasn't a parking space to be found. Clearly, not everyone was in Niagara Falls. The restaurant was busy for a Monday. It's a nice sports bar with too many TV's to distract you. But the service was good, the food was ample and we enjoyed our lunch together. If nothing else, we could visit with each other.
At the winery the set-up wasn’t as nice as we had been expecting but we got chairs and a table (the last ones – the other option was picnic table which would have been icing on the icing or camping out on the ground as many others were). But it was cloudy, overcast, a bit windy and quite cool. Fortunately it wasn't raining; although it looked like it might! We didn’t have enough clothes (at least Kate was cold the whole time).
And then there was nothing to see. The only saving grace was that it did get very dark and that was really interesting. If you are near a total eclipse, I would highly recommend seeking totality. However, although dark as night, the clouds prevented us seeing any stars or the eclipse itself. It was a bit odd to be in the middle of this darkness (at around 3:20 for a few minutes) with what looked like a sunrise peeking out all around in every direction at the far distance.
The winery provided some tastings that we shared. Lisa doesn't drink, she was our designate driver. But we didn't drink that much anyways. Any of us could have driven home. We joked a lot about
"The Rapture" and on the way home I noted a sign some zealot had posted: "Rapture - Almost Home. Jesus is coming back soon". Who ever posted that I bet they were disappointed God didn't take them home; I know I am. A friend Carol, in response to a Facebook posting on the subject, tells me:
"[At] breakfast the morning after the eclipse one of the servers commented that they had Jehovah Witness relatives who were planning for the rapture that was sure to happen during the eclipse. Jim asked her if she spoken to them yet that morning."
Thankfully we poor sinners were not taken by the rapture. As the darkness started to lift, the clouds parted a little and we saw a sliver of the sun and that was it. Kate was so disappointed. It didn’t help that friends in St. Marys, Burlington and elsewhere were writing to tell us how great it had been (“amazing” – Kate doesn't want to ever want to hear that word again). Apparently, the clouds had parted and it had cleared everywhere but in Niagara. Damn! Many friends we had convinced to take the event seriously and all who got to see it were impressed. Peter and Colleen have some great pictures of the totality that they caught near Cornwall a little later that day.
At that point, Kate is pretty disappointed but still okay. At this point we should have pulled into a bar, commiserated and maybe got drunk – something to make ourselves feel better but instead we headed back to Burlington in hopes of avoiding the traffice. Traffic wasn’t bad when we left but it got worse and worse until it was going very slow. When we left the winery, the mapping program told us it was 52 minutes to home. An hour later we were still 52 minutes from home and approaching the Burlington Skyway (a very long bridge) and Kate had to go to the bathroom. We did not want to chance being stuck on the bridge so we took one of the last possible exits and found a washroom at the local Walmart. We all went in to pee (except Lisa). The boys really had to go too but they weren’t as worried because they knew they could always go by the side of the road – we had already seen one car stopped for a kid to pee.
Well, it took about 45 minutes to get back on the road and then quite some time to get home. We had a pasta dinner together and Kate went to bed early. There are some end of the day photos of Dante's Inferno across the bay. I stayed up with Erich and Lisa to watch "The Bee Keeper" (2024) — a Bruce Willis styled action adventure starring Jason Statham. IMDB describes it as "One man's brutal campaign for vengeance takes on national stakes after he is revealed to be a former operative of a powerful and clandestine organization known as "Beekeepers."" I collect cameras, Erich collects movies.
Anyways, Kate is determined to see a total eclipse and disappointed that we missed out on this one. As they don't happen very often she suggests we might go to Spain where there's one coming up in August of 2027. Others comment that "The rain in Spain falls mainly on eclipse days".
