A month or so ago, I was researching some places to view the total solar eclipse that was passing through the country. One of my best friends mentioned a long time ago that he was interested in going to Jackson for a viewing party. When considering the map, I was pretty sure that everything west of Denver was going to be fairly impacted, so I began looking east. Additionally, since there quite a few open states on my map to fill up, I decided to look for races during that same weekend too so that I could multi-task.
Lo and behold, we found quite a race, one that was billed to be the most epic of them all – a race in Falls City, Nebraska, which terminates at the point of totality. Finishers would be able to view the totality from the finish line after the conclusion of the race. I was really excited for the race and invited my running friend from San Diego to join us for the weekend.
The three of us piled our camping equipment into the car and headed east of Denver into Kansas for the weekend. Our first stop was the geographic center of the United States. Erik had gone there on his driveabout earlier in the summer, and I was very envious. Since we were passing through anyways, we made a pit stop. It was really cool!
Along the way we passed by a few small towns sprinkled in between large farming communities. We got tired of the snacks we packed pretty quickly, so the stops served as good stretch breaks and snack breaks.
This is pretty much what it looked like until we got back to Denver. Really!
Anywho, we set up our campsite in Old Town, Kansas. It was sunset by the time we got there, so there aren’t any photos. I was setting up the tent in the wind as Erik was getting the fire going. No time for photos as we were busy swatting bugs and keeping our equipment from flying away. We eventually settled into dinner, drinks, smores, showers, and sleep. My hardy tent has now traveled to another state with me — CA, AZ, WA, WY, and now KS. I keep thinking that it’s time for a new tent, but whenever it unfurls and holds up for one more trip I put it off for just one more night.
Anyhow, we woke up the next morning to a beautiful sunrise, had our overnight oats for breakfast, and embarked on our one-hour journey to Falls City, Nebraska for our race.
The skies were looking pretty clear so we had a good feeling about the race. We got to their town square to grab our bibs and t-shirt. The field was fairly small, but everyone seemed really excited to be there. It seemed like the race volunteers were pretty new at putting on races before, which seemed normal since the city population was somewhere in the range of 4,300.
Before the race got started, we couldn’t even grab coffee in the town square. The bakery didn’t take credit cards and didn’t have a bathroom. We had to head over a few blocks to the grocery store instead.
Erik and Arlene decided to run with me during this race. Maybe it was the smaller field, or the novelty of the event, or the fact that the race was going to be on a major highway for most of the way. I told them ahead of time that I was running 40 second walk/run intervals. I actually kept warning them over and over again. Erik did groan a bit after the first quarter mile but he let up afterwards. I insisted that they continue on without me but they stuck around, which ended up being a good thing because Erik got rid of his water bottle before the race and our water stations were very far away. The weather changed constantly during the race: it was cool one minute, heated up the next, with dashes of thunder and rain and sun and clouds the next. Then repeat that for the next 3 hours while having to run on and off the highway, on the road, on the shoulder, and in the adjacent trail, while dodging cars and semis. It was really quite the adventure!
We finally got to the finish line, without the usual fanfare…just with a sense of accomplishment and a heaping sense of fatigue. And anticipation for the eclipse!
The eclipse itself was amazing. It lasted about 2 and a half minutes. Although most of it was obscured by clouds, we witnessed the sky falling dark, the cool air blowing through, and then dusk reappearing.
After the eclipse, we all piled into a volunteer’s van and headed the 13.1 miles back to the start line and headed home. When pulling our directions home, I looked at the Google Maps traffic for the areas in the path of the totality –
So fascinating. It was really a once-in-a-lifetime event!
Amara in Training 