I chose driving into total eclipse territory as the start of my 2024 RV season.
I had driven to Lapeer, where I stored my rig for the winter the previous weekend to reverse what I had done to prepare it for winter storage. I discovered the winterization video I watched had misinformed me as to the position my power switch should be in, though my camper batteries were fine the battery to turnover the engine was dead. The power switch on, opens van battery to receive a trickle charge from the shore power connection after the camper batteries are at full charge. My brother put the dead battery on his charger, and with the power switch in the correct position everything was fully charged when I returned.
I thought “the trip into totality” would be good to trial run before I headed out on longer ventures. If I was still in the Navy, we’d call it a “shakedown cruise.”
It would also be the first time my brother Gary would join me. I intended on him being the first to do so last year, but his dental appointments and a shoulder operation didn’t allow that to happen.
When I was in the service, I use to think about things I wanted to do with my, then, “little brother” after my discharge; by the time I got my head right and pretty much adjusted to civilian life, my brother was in his teens and into teen things, shortly after I was off again, this time to college. So, none of the things I thought about ever happened; that is, until we entered retirement age. Though I would have never imagined it, it was as old farts we actually embarked on the very things I had hoped to do at a much younger age; camping, kayaking, XC skiing; I even got him to mountain bike around Grand Island in Lake Superior, for which I hope he has since forgiven me. It was not exactly the return to a bicycle seat one would choose after not perching on anything that narrow in at least 20 years.
After bicycle fiasco which included snapping off his seat trying to make it more comfortable and introducing him to hammock camping, I owed him a little comfort. So, in my search for an RV, something that would sleep two, that didn’t involve spooning, was a strong consideration.
I promised to attend a birthday celebration for my friend Joanne that was supposed to be late Saturday afternoon, but due to restaurant delays, ended up being early evening, so my arrival in Lapeer wasn’t until around 9:30 that night. Which would leave RV prep to the morning.
After a light breakfast Sunday morning I filled the freshwater tank, we packed the camper and set off at 10:00 am. I decided to take US 23 rather than I-75 through Detroit. I expected more traffic after all the media hype forewarning hordes of eclipse chasers.
I had considered catching the event someplace near Cleveland, then Lima, Ohio where they had a big eclipse celebration planned but I learned some friends had actually found a room in Celina, Ohio. I thought if they found a room this late in the game perhaps the town wouldn’t be that crowded. Googling it, found it to be a smaller town than the forementioned, it had a number of parks around it and a Walmart as a back-up of last resort. It was also close to the center of the totality path across Ohio.
The path of totality
We arrived in Celina somewhere between 2:30 and 3:00 pm. Until we checked campgrounds only a packed fairground, opened to eclipse camping, showed any evidence of the multitudes the media had predicted.
The first park we checked out turned out to be just a day park, no camping. After that we decided to go to dinner and perhaps someone at the restaurant would have some info on campgrounds but found that not to be so. We had dinner at La Carreta a very good Mexican restaurant, with reasonable prices. Gary said it was the best chimichanga he’d ever had. I had a combination fajita that had everything from sizzling steak to shrimp, with all the usual Mexican trimmings, it was tasty, as well and more than I could eat. Along with it, I had the largest horchata I’d ever seen.
Good Mexican eats.
After dinner we went to check out the Walmart incase that would end up being where we’d be camping that night. My brother also wanted to pick up a towel. I was surprised not to see any RVs there. It wasn’t the best parking lot for camping, most I’ve stayed at had some out of the way part of the parking lot where you’d find RVs and truckers spending the night. This one was in the middle of a very long parking area servicing other establishments on both sides.
We left Walmart to check out the campgrounds in the area. After we found no vacancies at the state campground, we sat in their parking area and called the privately owned campgrounds listed and found them all full, except one, whom for $200.00 would have happily found space for us. Some of them had been booked for a year; before I even thought about the sun disappearing.
Before we headed back into town, I asked Waze to take us to the local Legion post. I suggested we have a beer and possibly get some local info. We pulled into a very nice Post 210. I don’t recall if I mentioned it to my brother, but I had an ulterior motive, a hope they might let us boondock in their lot. If I didn’t mention it, he must have had suspicions as it is very rare for me to just stop somewhere for a beer alone, rather than with a lunch, or dinner.
We were greeted in the parking lot by a woman we would soon learn was the post commander’s wife. She asked me if we were members, I told her I was and showed her my card. This allowed us to enter through the back door. It was too bad we were both full on Mexican food because they had quite a spread of food inside. She asked us where we were from and promised she wouldn’t hold it against us that we were from Michigan. We would find just the opposite later. I could not believe all the Michigan fans at the bar, most of them transplants from Michigan.
She asked us where we were staying, I told her of the campground situation and said we’d probably find ourselves in the Walmart parking lot. That’s when I heard what I had hoped for, she said she would check with her husband, but didn’t think there would be a problem with us staying in the post’s back lot. Not long after, her husband not only confirmed that but said he would open the bathrooms for our use. They were part of a large storage building with an open-air bar on the side that they used in the summer. We really lucked out, a place to stay, bathrooms, and $2.00 drafts, from a local brewery, in the main building. As I said it was a very nice post. A large main building with a pavilion in the rear and the open-air bar I mentioned before. The main building had a kitchen where you could order burgers, fries and other sandwiches, not to mention a daily special.
American legion Post 210
I joined the American Legion six years ago after the Lapeer post 16, did such a beautiful tribute to my dad at his memorial, but this was the first time I had ever entered a post.
Celina, correctly pronounced, as pointed out by locals, SA-LINE-NA, is such a friendly, hospitable place. When my brother was looking for a towel at Walmart a young woman came up to him and said, “I don’t work here, but can I help you find something?” When I forgot my leftover box at the Mexican restaurant our waiter ran out with it, catching us in the parking lot. The hospitality was doubly so at post 210. We even received some hugs when we left.
Gary’s first Camp in the RV
It was quite convenient only having to cross the parking lot from the bar to our beds, but I limited my liquid intake, knowing I had to navigate a ladder from my bed in the sky-bunk each time nature called.
It rained most of the night and I fell to sleep quite quickly listening to it pelt the roof of the camper.
Seeing a heavily clouded sky on an early morning trip to the restroom, was of some concern, but I was happy to find the skies clear and blue when we got up for the day. I made some camp coffee, fired up the generator, and microwaved some breakfast sandwiches to begin the day.
Our Eclipse campsite
In the late morning a guy showed up and set up a sound system and moved some picnic tables for a planned eclipse party. Not knowing how many might attend we moved the RV and reset our camp at the end of the lot. As it turned out the party only amounted to about 20 patrons. I think a lot of people just watched eclipse from home as that number doubled post eclipse. The guy that set up the soundtrack had put some thought into it as much of the music was sun or moon related. Everything from “Dark Side of the Moon” to “Here Comes the Sun.”
Don’t worry, he used the proper protection for the eclipse.
About 2:10 I thought I’d try my eclipse glasses and look up at the sun, I was surprised to find the moon had already begun to encroach on it. As it advanced toward totality, the first thing I really noticed, was the drop in temperature. It became eerie as darkness began to envelop everything and a sunny afternoon transcended to midnight. I must say I was more awestruck than I expected, especially at totality when you could see sun flares escaping around the edges. I was totally drawn in, only snapped from that mesmerization when the cheers and applause of the eclipse partiers erupted behind me. I sat down in my camp chair and watched until full sunlight returned, that seemed to take longer than the lunar conquest to eliminate it.
It all begins.
Totality
In late afternoon Gary and I headed up to the main building and ordered some burger baskets for supper. We spent the rest of the evening making more friends and visiting with some we had met the day before. When the post commander came in, I asked him if we could stay another night as I really didn’t want to join everyone else heading home. He said that was no problem, bought us both beers and said we were welcome back anytime we were in the area. As I said friendly people. Though we were told it wasn’t necessary, we left the post a donation to thank them for their hospitality.
Gary didn’t have to be back until April 11th, I wanted to take advantage of that and rather than drive straight back, come up with something to further our adventure. I considered visiting some friends in Virginia but thought it would be rude to drop in without an invite and with so little notice. After some Googling I decided Niagara Falls, a place neither of us have been in decades, wouldn’t be too far and a better fit into our time frame. From there we’d take the Canadian route back to Michigan.
When we returned to the camper I pulled in my awning, we packed away everything that we had set up beneath it and went to bed or as my dad used to say, “hit the sack.” All I had to do in the morning is pull down the sky-bunk and we’d make a quick exit, and that is exactly what we did. We stopped for breakfast at a Bob Evans then headed out to the northeast.
Before this story leaves Ohio there is a couple things I have to mention. Birds: Celina has an unusually high number of low-flying birds which I can only conclude is the reason for their unusually high amount of winged roadkill; I would say at least 90%. I saw everything from an owl to Canada geese, I think I even saw a pelican. Being on the edge of Grand Lake, which is about 4 times larger than the city, I assume explains it all.
Ohio roads signs: I saw signs on Ohio highway that I have never seen anywhere else. There are helpful signs telling you the distance between rest stops ahead. It took a couple for me to figure out the changing digital numbers indicated the number of open spaces there are for trucks. Then there are strange signs, some that to warn you of drug activity, therefore impaired drivers in addition are similar signs for distracted driving. Are they in the vein of the signs you see for slow children? I never did understand the signs warning of “variable speed limit ahead,” with no signs indicating what those speeds limits were.
Is that the number for the Impaired to call?
We crossed the state line into Pennsylvania at 2:57 pm and New York at 4:21 pm adding two more states to my RV’s history. Driving across New York state I was beginning to think my GPS, using Google maps, had tapped into an algorithm that indicated I was a wine drinker as it took us off the turnpike onto 2-lanes where vineyards lined both sides of the road all the way to Buffalo. I lost count of the wineries. In Seneca, NY named after the Seneca tribe of the Iroquois nation, I stopped at a Native American owned full-service gas station where gas was 50 cents cheaper per gallon than anything I’d seen anywhere else, the attendant told me the reason I was diverted through wine country was construction on I-90. It was a bit slower but more scenic and void of tolls.
I didn’t note what time we pulled into Niagara Falls, probably around 6:00 pm. We didn’t find any place to camp there so drove to the closest campground a nice HTR campground on Grand Island, about 10 miles away. We didn’t attempt to find a place to “boondock” as my brother was yearning a hot shower, and I hadn’t taken my hot water heater out of winter mode, thinking April might yet have some freezing temperatures in store.
HTR is a premium campground, more expensive than I’m accustomed to. It has RV and tent sites as well as cabins. We camped at a tent site. The hosts told us the campground normally didn’t open until May but had opened early to take advantage of the eclipse’s draw. They assigned us a campsite and said we could pay when the office staff arrived in the morning.
After checking out our site we drove to a nearby eatery the camp hosts recommended. When we returned, we found a young couple in the next campsite trying to set up a tent under the illumination of their car’s headlights. I guess we should have offered assistance as when answering a nature call at 3:00 am, I found only an empty tent box at their campsite. Though it might be time consuming it is always wise to take a trial run setting a up new tent before you take to the woods, especially if there’s any chance you may be pitching that tent after sundown. In other words, avoid pitching a virgin tent at your campsite.
After enjoying hot showers, I nuked the remaining breakfast sandwich for my brother and some bacon for me along with some hardboiled eggs I had apparently placed a tad too close to the freezer compartment in my fridge. Though the taste wasn’t bad, microwave thawed, frozen hardboiled eggs are not the most appealing sight, not to mention texture.
We paid for our overnight and headed to the falls. We drove across and parked on Goat Island next to another RV, you could tell the couple in it held the small dogs with them in very high regard. It seemed they had tailored the interior of their rig more for canine comfort than their own. It had raised beds along the windows for the pooches’ on-the-road viewing. They told me about some additional boondock opportunities I was not aware of, like Pro Bass Shops, Cabela’s and Dick’s sport shops. I only had knowledge of Casinos, Walmart’s and Cracker Barrels.
Horseshoe Falls
Gary’s new friend.
Niagara Falls on Sibling Day 2024
We viewed everything we could on the American side then crossed and did the same on the Canadian side. Much of the views on the American side was obscured by a thick morning mist. I returned to the camper to get my coat as a mere flannel shirt was not nearly enough to keep me warm. Parking was more expensive on the Canadian side. We pulled up to a place that had an ATM type machine, but the money only went one way. Fortunately. before we saw how expensive it was before it sucked in our card info. We took turns running across the street to see and snap pictures of the falls, leaving one of us in the RV in case a parking cop should warrant our moving.
View from Canada.
I was surprised to find that Lapeer was only 3 hours and 54 minutes from Niagara Falls. I discovered nothing Google related worked in Canada. I had to switch to my RV’s Tom/Tom GPS.
We made stop at a Tim Horton’s to replenish Gary’s Coffee mug, a necessity, then headed north. Traffic was light and it was a smooth trip all the way back to Lapeer, including our border crossing. It had been a good trip and I was glad, rather than a straight route to Celina and back we made it more of a circle, with the inclusion of Niagara Falls.
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