Oct 14, 2023
Written By: J.Couch
We flew down to Austin to visit my sister and her husband and see their new home that they had just built in the Lake Travis area. One of our main reasons besides visiting family was to also watch the solar eclipse that was supposed to go across the San Antonio and Fredericksburg area. This was not a full eclipse but the ring of fire that was going on this weekend. This is where the moon goes across in front of the sun but does not completely block it out, leaving a ring of fire. You need to have the glasses to see this, otherwise you may just burn out your retinas. Thankfully we had picked some up before coming down here. We came prepared.
We got up early Saturday morning and drove west towards Fredericksburg. We decided that area would be a little less crowded than in San Antonio, and it was actually even a little closer. We didn’t make it all the way to Fredericksburg, we ended up stopping at a cowboy store called Yee Haw Ranch Outfitters outside of Fredericksburg. My brother-in-law said that he has wanted to stop and see this place when he’s passed by there before. We looked around inside for a while just to kill some time and check out the shop. They have a lot of cowboy or ranch wear and the place is packed with all sorts of cool things to look at, like a crazy looking stuffed monkey.
We soon realized that the solar eclipse was starting and we needed to get outside and watch it. Out in the parking lot we put on our solar glasses and looked up, the moon was starting to cross in front of the sun. It was starting to partially block out the sun, but at that point there was no difference in lighting. It never completely blocked out the sun so it was more like dusk and things just seemed to be less vivid. One thing that you could really tell was the temperature difference, it dropped at least 10 to 15° from what it was.
This was a very cool experience and I’m glad we got a chance to go down and see it. It would have been cool to be able to see it through a solar telescope or something like that, but seeing it through the solar glasses was good enough too. There is supposed to be another solar eclipse in the Texas area again in April. We would like to try to go see that one too if we can make it down that way. That one will be a full solar eclipse and go across the Dallas area too. We will see how that works out.
Thanks for wandering with us,
The Wandering Couchs
