Solar Eclipse Guide: Where to Camp and What to Know

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Submitted by Anonymous on Mon, 07/31/2017 - 14:00

To encourage Americans to get outside for the 2017 solar eclipse, Hipcamp —a startup that creates new campsites by unlocking access to beautiful private lands such as nature preserves, farms, and ranches—is sharing 5 essential eclipse facts and 789 places to camp in the path of totality.

THE SUN WILL PUT A RING ON IT

In the last few seconds before the eclipse, sunlight streaming through the Moon's valleys creates a bright flash of light on the side of the moon known as the "diamond ring effect."

CORONA ISN'T JUST A DRINK

That glowing light halo around the dark solar eclipse has a name—it's the "corona," described by NASA as "the sun's tenuous atmosphere."

THE 7-YEAR ITCH IS REAL

The last solar eclipse on the west coast occurred 38 years ago, so you don’t want to miss this opportunity. If you miss this eclipse, you'll have to wait until April 8, 2024 for the next one. It will carve a path from Maine to Texas. The 2017 eclipse will run from South Carolina to Oregon.

OUR PLANETS GO THE DISTANCE

The Earth, Moon, and Sun are currently perfect distances from each other, meaning we can see the corona during this eclipse. Millions of years ago, it was blocked. And millions of years in the future, total eclipses won't be possible because the Moon will appear smaller than the sun.

'GREECE' IS THE WORD

The earliest predicted solar eclipse was in Ancient Greece in 585 BC. It was seen as an omen—one that caused a long-standing battle between the Medes and the Lydians to finally end!

Lodging and camping in the path of totality has been booked for months, and prices can be sky high. To make eclipse-viewing available to all, Hipcamp has been partnering with landowners to create new campsites in the eclipse path—over 1,300 new campsites popped up on Hipcamp in Oregon alone last month.

Hipcamp has also compiled the best available map of all camping options for viewing the total eclipse. The best part? Most of the new campsites are on land previously inaccessible to the public and waiting to be explored.

To see a map of all the places to camp on the path of the totality, visit here: https://www.hipcamp.com/discover/eclipse-2017. And if you don't know quite where to start, they can help with that, too: https://www.hipcamp.com/journal/guides/how-to-plan-a-2017-eclipse-camping-trip