I believe the traffic jam deserves
to have the Guinness World Record.
Started 8/22/2017
Posted approximately the above date:
We went to see the eclipse.
My buddy, Jerry called me up one day and asked, "Hey Jou, you want to go see the Eclipse?"
I said "Yes," really quick before he could change his mind!
Go see the Eclipse?
Hell yeah!
But it's too much for me alone.
550 miles, one-day to do it and make it to work on Tuesday.
Get off work Sunday night, meet Jerry and drive like crazy to Oregon, (10 hours to Madras,) then rest whatever extra time we had.
Watch the eclipse about 10:18 in the morning and drive like hell to get home for work the next day.
We started out figuring we could be home by about 10 pm.
It's only one extreme road trip, then recuperate.
We can do that.
Then we started hearing about traffic Armageddon so we revised our plans.
Instead of starting about 7 pm when I would get off work, I took the day off and we left about 1 pm.
We figured we'd add a couple hours to the time getting home, too.
No biggie.
We'll be ready for work on Tuesday, just like we're supposed to be.
Well, we got there about 10 - 11 pm and things were rocking.
Eclipse parties everywhere!
All the regular rooms and campsites sold out long ago, (we knew that... no problem.)
Thousands of additional campsites sold out, interesting news.
Thousands of 'Parking Spots" where you could sleep in your vehicle, ($45 -$200 night) sold out!
WOW!
This begins to sound interesting.
So we get there and find a place to park in front of a bar with a campfire going and we walk up and down town once.
Well, the three or four blocks that were the main part of downtown, anyway.
We even see these guys with a campstove and a table selling hot dogs in a parking lot.
We got to talking to them and bought a couple dogs to eat and they pointed out the building where they were parked selling their hot dogs was not a business, and was in fact even being sold.
Why don't we just park there?
We did, of course, and had one of the best seats in town about 100 yards away for the eclipse the next morning.
Posted approximately the above date:
We went to see the eclipse.
My buddy, Jerry called me up one day and asked, "Hey Jou, you want to go see the Eclipse?"
I said "Yes," really quick before he could change his mind!
Go see the Eclipse?
Hell yeah!
But it's too much for me alone.
550 miles, one-day to do it and make it to work on Tuesday.
Get off work Sunday night, meet Jerry and drive like crazy to Oregon, (10 hours to Madras,) then rest whatever extra time we had.
Watch the eclipse about 10:18 in the morning and drive like hell to get home for work the next day.
We started out figuring we could be home by about 10 pm.
It's only one extreme road trip, then recuperate.
We can do that.
Then we started hearing about traffic Armageddon so we revised our plans.
Instead of starting about 7 pm when I would get off work, I took the day off and we left about 1 pm.
We figured we'd add a couple hours to the time getting home, too.
No biggie.
We'll be ready for work on Tuesday, just like we're supposed to be.
Well, we got there about 10 - 11 pm and things were rocking.
Eclipse parties everywhere!
All the regular rooms and campsites sold out long ago, (we knew that... no problem.)
Thousands of additional campsites sold out, interesting news.
Thousands of 'Parking Spots" where you could sleep in your vehicle, ($45 -$200 night) sold out!
WOW!
This begins to sound interesting.
So we get there and find a place to park in front of a bar with a campfire going and we walk up and down town once.
Well, the three or four blocks that were the main part of downtown, anyway.
We even see these guys with a campstove and a table selling hot dogs in a parking lot.
We got to talking to them and bought a couple dogs to eat and they pointed out the building where they were parked selling their hot dogs was not a business, and was in fact even being sold.
Why don't we just park there?
We did, of course, and had one of the best seats in town about 100 yards away for the eclipse the next morning.
Watching the Moon Eat the Sun
TOTALITY.
You wouldn't believe how dark it got and how fast!
So, we drove for 9-10 hours to see the eclipse.
Was it worth it?
YES!
BUT...
The Eclipse was awesome!
Yeah, I know that word gets overused, still...
But, then it came time to leave!
I hit the post office, where I mailed these cool letters
with the eclipse stamps from totality on the day it happened.
Actually, within minutes of the totality!
Then we hopped in to the car and spent the next half hour driving
one block to where we could turn south towards home.
It seems like it took us an hour to get out of town... one mile.
People would get out and wander around while waiting.
They would walk alongside their cars when they moved.
The city council had the local kids out there
handing out water to people sitting in their cars.
It took 13 hours to drive the next 107 miles!
See, there was an accident south of us in Chemault,
(thanks Google maps,)
and every highway went through there!
People would get out and walk beside their cars at times
and every once in a while we would get a little faster for a mile or three.
We got off the highway once.
I'm a good navigator so we went exploring to get on a different highway miles away.
We ended up on dirt roads and would have connected EXCEPT
we ran into people coming from there looking for better traffic where we came from.
So we parallelled the road going south until we saw traffic jams ahead on the dirt roads we were following.
Then we got back on the same highway we left an hour ago and about 6-7 miles north of here...
And we were 4 vehicles behind a motorhome we had been 3 spaces in front of!
We spent an hour or so navigating dirt roads to gain 6-7 miles and lose 7 traffic spaces.
We just got back on the highway and stayed there.
We left Madras about 11 am in the morning and at about
1 am the next morning we hit Chemault and
there's this cop in the street just steadily waving traffic through.
Traffic went back to normal then.
It only took about 8 more hours to get home.
We neither one made it for work.
The Eclipse was awesome!
Yeah, I know that word gets overused, still...
But, then it came time to leave!
I hit the post office, where I mailed these cool letters
with the eclipse stamps from totality on the day it happened.
Actually, within minutes of the totality!
Then we hopped in to the car and spent the next half hour driving
one block to where we could turn south towards home.
It seems like it took us an hour to get out of town... one mile.
People would get out and wander around while waiting.
They would walk alongside their cars when they moved.
The city council had the local kids out there
handing out water to people sitting in their cars.
It took 13 hours to drive the next 107 miles!
See, there was an accident south of us in Chemault,
(thanks Google maps,)
and every highway went through there!
People would get out and walk beside their cars at times
and every once in a while we would get a little faster for a mile or three.
We got off the highway once.
I'm a good navigator so we went exploring to get on a different highway miles away.
We ended up on dirt roads and would have connected EXCEPT
we ran into people coming from there looking for better traffic where we came from.
So we parallelled the road going south until we saw traffic jams ahead on the dirt roads we were following.
Then we got back on the same highway we left an hour ago and about 6-7 miles north of here...
And we were 4 vehicles behind a motorhome we had been 3 spaces in front of!
We spent an hour or so navigating dirt roads to gain 6-7 miles and lose 7 traffic spaces.
We just got back on the highway and stayed there.
We left Madras about 11 am in the morning and at about
1 am the next morning we hit Chemault and
there's this cop in the street just steadily waving traffic through.
Traffic went back to normal then.
It only took about 8 more hours to get home.
We neither one made it for work.
Finally finished and posted April 13, 2018. Jou Baur
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