Eclipse 2024: BBQ, Clouds, and a Serendipitous Window

by | Apr 13, 2024 | Travel | 0 comments

Dave and I traveled to Austin, Texas, for the eclipse!

Dave had been obsessing about the weather reports for several weeks before (and, I later learned, he’d been checking the weather for April in Texas for the last several years).

We flew out Saturday and got home Wednesday–yay Southwest.

Dave’s parents, Rosemary and Curtis, took a leisurely drive from Orange County, California, through Arizona, New Mexico, and across half of Texas. They left Texas Thursday after surviving an apparently quite dramatic hail and lightning storm!

(While travelling from vet school to my first vet job in San Pedro I did the drive in 3 days: a long day to El Paso, then another long day to Phoenix (stopped to see a friend), then to Los Angeles. I’ve also made the drive from Sierra Vista Arizona to Austin in a very long day of driving. I10 is not a lot of fun.)

Dave and I booked a cute Airbnb near Dripping Springs, Texas. Rosemary and Curtis found one nearby. Due to a Turo nightmare, Rosemary and Curtis ended up schlepping us to Jester King Brewery on Saturday for dinner. (They actually schlepped us everywhere. Never again, Turo.)

At Jester King, Dave, an avowed metalhead, was thrilled to see this sign:

Doom Metal Goat Yoga sign

though apparently the session had already ended.

The last time we’d been to Jester King was when my dad was still alive, so longer than 10 years ago. It’s expanded so much since that time, but is still a really fun brewery to visit. We shared some super tasty pizza (the George Clinton, blue cheese and hot honey etc) and tried some fun beers.

The next day we had BBQ at the Salt Lick in Driftwood. Good Texas bbq (though I’m partial to Black’s for the actual food) in a drop dead gorgeous setting. Here’s a pic of me and Dave on the Salt Lick Cellars deck (gotta say, I was rocking a great hair day!) waiting for our table & enjoying some Texas rosé (we also got a bottle of the BBQ Red that we finished the next day, also tasty).

What? you wanna see BBQ? Okay!

Pork ribs, brisket, sausage!

The next day was eclipse day, aka Dave constantly fretting over whether we should get in the car (well, Rosemary’s car) and brave traffic in hopes of better weather. We decided to stay put–if nothing else, we’d get that eerie darkness at totality–but we got totally (ha ha) lucky with random breaks in the clouds up to about 10 minutes or so before totality.

And then…a fifteen minute or so window where there was a break in the clouds, just where the sun and moon were.

Dave had his telescope, Curtis had his binoculars, we all had eclipse glasses, and the couple in the adjacent cabin had a nifty camera set up.

So overall a successful trip! Dave’s already planning a trip to Spain summer 2026 for us to see another total.

Were you able to see the eclipse?

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