My eclipse experience started at 3:00 am on the day of the eclipse. I left Louisville CO and headed north. I had no real plans other than to get under the path of totality.
Despite all of the warnings I’d heard about massive traffic getting to and from the event, I was going to risk it. The location I was going to was in Wyoming, just north of Torringtonabout as far East as one can get without passing into Nebraska.
Interstate 25 was a nightmare already, so I cut over to Greeley and then just kept heading north.
Soooo much traffic. 10:00AM. Long frigging drive. Every traffic light and stop sign along the route was backed up for miles(literally). I was stressing that I wouldn’t make it in time. At some point I figured out that I was under the path of totality, and stopped stressing. I continued further north until I found a random farm right under the eclipse. $20 / car. Awesome. This will do. Huge farm. Huuuuuge. I saw about 400 cars setting up for the eclipse. The farmer made a killing I'm sure.
I got my my gear set up right as the eclipse is starting. I actually didn't miss a thing. I was able to take one single shot of the sun before the eclipse started. I instantly knew that the wind was going to cause me issues, so I moved all of my gear.
I was glad I had my solar scope (Coronado Solarmax II w/ double-stack filters) for sharing the view and my camera for taking pictures. (Nikon D300S) Lots of folks stopped by to look in the solar scope.
Opened up my solar glasses to put them on only to find out I had 10 pair. Neighbors were thankful.
The eclipse was amazing. Took my breath away.
4.5 hour ETA Home. OK, lets do this. I sat on the same road for 7+ hours and only went about 60 miles. Thank goodness for Audiobooks. I finally made it home. Actual time of arrival? 10:15PM. (10.5 hour. Should have taken 4.5 in normal traffic) Next time I will be camping instead of driving on eclipse day!
The photos below were all taken by me. None of these photos were manipulated in photoshop other than to resize them or to re-position them.
Camera and Lens combination: Nikon D300S, Nikon 200-500mm 5.6E ED, Nikon 1.5 Teleconverter, Daystar Solar Filter
This was my first eclipse and I loved it. I learned a lot about taking photos during the event and can’t wait until 2024 to see the next one.
Continue to Part 2 for additional images:
https://steemit.com/photography/@rebele93/2017-total-solar-eclipse-images-part-2
If you like my photos, please follow me as I have a lot more images to post and share.
Also, I'm new here on Steemit.com. Here is my Intro Post: https://steemit.com/introducemyself/@rebele93/another-minnow-learning-to-swim-in-a-very-big-pond
Cheers,
Mike Bryant (Rebele93)
https://steemit.com/@rebele93