RU848789

Left the Plymouth area around 8.30 am just when the 93 slowdown was starting at Franconia Notch where 93 goes to 1 lane each way and ditched off 93 20 min later when that delay had ballooned to 25 min and building. Took 112 to 116 which was 20 min slower than a clear 93 would've been but probably saved us 20 min and was quite scenic. Got to Pittsburg in 2.45 and just had a great meal at Buck's which includes free parking and drink service outside during the eclipse. Nice. 93 looks like a parking lot now. Not a cloud in the sky. Let's go!

We "flew" up from NJ this morning, leaving at 6 am, with very little traffic, going the 341 miles in 5 hours. The B&B is very nice and did not gouge us at all. Had time to drive through Franconia Notch as a side trip and then did a drive up through the Kancamagus Pass in the White Mts - gorgeous with ~2 feet of snow on the ground still at 2000-3000' in elevation, consisting of about 6-8" of soft remaining snow from a few days ago, on top of maybe 12-15" of icy/crusty hard pack (vs. just a few inches at 1000' or so at our B&B, all of which melted during the mild day). Still debating Newport VT vs. Pittsburg NH, but the latest NBM and 18Z Euro have me nervous, so leaning heavily towards Pittsburg, which is 45 miles east of Newport, giving us some cushion. Not a bad view from the huge suite at Coppertoppe NH B&B (nice folks who run it and they didn't price gouge at all)...and here's a nice snow pic from Kancamagus...

Wow, we hit no traffic there about 2.5 hours ago - or on the whole ride from NJ, leaving at 6 am.

We "flew" up from NJ this morning, with very little traffic, going the 341 miles in 5 hours. Now safely ensconced in our B&B after an awesome breakfast at Gilly's in Bristol. Will likely do Franconia Notch as a side trip this afternoon unless traffic picks up too much. Still debating Newport (Nearby Jay Peak is open for the eclipse with free parking if you get there early) vs. Pittsburg - if clouds look iffy to the west, we'll pick Pittsburg as it's 45 miles east of Newport. Not a bad view from the huge suite at Coppertoppe B&B...

Thanks for the intel. Actually, our B&B is in North Hebron but was saying Plymouth as it's the nearest "city." Had heard of this section of 93 being gorgeous, so was actually looking forward to going that way, which is why we were hoping leaving by 8 am would be early enough to avoid bad traffic. That gets us to the Notch around 8:30 am and to Pittsburg by 10:30 am if traffic is reasonable - we're prepared to just hang around for a few hours at our destination before the event (and after) and will have plenty of food and beverages and I even still have my old Rand McNally Road Atlas as backup, lol. We'll be up earlier checking traffic and if it is looking bad earlier than 8 am, we'll just leave earlier. And if it looked really bad at the Notch, we'd go around it on 25/116 back to 91/3 in Franconia (adds 25 min, but could be worth it). We also would probably rather go to Newport, VT, but have been worried about how close the clouds come to there - if it looks good on Monday am, we'd likely go there and can take 91 instead of 93. It also helps that we're retired so it's really not a big deal to us to go early to avoid traffic or to wait a few hours after the event to leave, since we don't have to be anywhere (we have the B&B Monday night too)

Yes, meant center line - I just want to be reasonably close to it so that we get totality for 3+ minutes and all of the locations you and I have mentioned are over 3 minutes of totality (vs. 3:33 of totality, roughly, along the center line) - Pittsburg is 3:13.

Just spoke to the owner of the BuckRubPub in Pittsburg, NH (3 min 14 sec of totality vs. 3:34 along the center line of totality) and he said it's going to be a madhouse - first come first served to get into the pub and their parking, but he did say there was parking available. You can see some on the map as it is a small town of 800 with some businesses, but I saw a story where they were planning for anywhere from 5000 to 20,000 people and were worried about any more than 5-6K. I could also see the forecasts for clouds sending people in NY/VT east... https://www.facebook.com/buckrubpub

We're heading to a B&B in Plymouth early tomorrow and then had always figured it would be a Monday morning decision on where to go from there. The past few days we were also thinking Newport, NH, as it looked clearer than further west, like Burlington and is still pretty close to totality, but we're also not happy with the cloud trends and have been thinking of Pittsburg, NH, which is about 15 miles NE of Colebrook. Another possibility is heading another 15 miles all the way up Rt. 3 to the border at Connecticut Lake State Forest, as it's a bit closer to totality, but I have zero idea how that road would be and if there's somewhere good to watch near there - no obvious towns and the one campground (Deer Mountain Campground about 4 miles from the border) says it's temporarily closed, but I think that's just because their camping season doesn't start until May. My guess is one could just pull over and trudge through the snow to what looks like a nice clearing (we have nice chairs, lol) or maybe the US Customs folks won't mind people parking near there and watching. No idea and not even sure who to ask (NH Parks/Rec is closed, lol). And if the clouds really move further east, I guess we may have to go somewhere in Maine, but anywhere near totality, like Coburn Gore or Jackman will add a few hours to the trip, since there's no fast/easy way there - it's about 2:20 from Plymouth to Pittsburg, but it's 4:00 to Coburn Gore and 4:50 to Jackman and that's if traffic isn't bad. I imagine thousands of others are pondering these same questions. My wife's already not happy about a 2:20 drive from our B&B, so a 4+ hour drive won't go over much better, lol, but I might have to put my foot down on this one, as I really want a good shot at clear skies (I know there's no guarantee as 5 minutes of clouds in front of the sun at totality could happen on a 95% clear day).

Exactly why I'm deciding where to go on Sunday afternoon, after the 12Z models come out. And even then, one can have a "sunny" forecast, but clouds could crop up just at the point of the eclipse ruining the blocked sun visual (but not all the other cool effects of daytime darkness). And areas forecast to have clouds could simply get lucky for 5-10 minutes. It's going to be a bit of a crapshoot right up until totality.

That's why I said the forecast could change significantly, which is why we're keeping our options wide open...

Oddly enough, 6 days out and the best looking area, as of now, is probably VT/NH/Maine and one of the worst is Texas, which is not what climo would tell us (good friends of mine are departing for Texas shortly for the eclipse and a week of vacation), although we know this can change significantly over the next several days. All three sources below are fairly similar on this (I'm guessing the Times and AccuWeather are both using the NWS NBM for cloud cover, but not sure). We're continuing with our plan of waiting until the day before to make a decision on where to go within fairly easy driving distance, i.e., roughly between about Cleveland (~7.5 hrs/470 miles) and Jackman Maine (~8 hr/500 miles), with Watertown, NY being the closest point of totality (~5 hrs/310 miles), although we'd likely pick a bit north of Burlington VT as our top choice if Burlington and Watertown were looking both clear (north of BTV is ~5.5 hr/340 miles). We'd then drive close to that destination Sunday afternoon/evening, stay in a hotel and then drive the rest of the way Monday morning to some point of totality (right on the center line if possible). https://www.accuweather.com/en/sola...orecast-what-will-the-weather-be-like/1636042 https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/science/solar-eclipse-cloud-cover-forecast-map.html

Deep winter still here in Metuchen. Have had 2+" otg here since last Tuesday (10 days), which is nice. 24.6" on the season, which is more than anyone on the entire NE corridor from VA to Boston - not sure that's ever happened for me in my 30 years here, as we've gotten quite lucky this winter, especially with the amazing 11.25" on Saturday, which, in retrospect, is, I think, the most snow I've ever had over a 5 hour period, as it was just pouring with 4"/hr over one 30 minute period. Top 5 all-time storm for me because of the sustained heavy snow and the huge overperformance relative to forecasts.

Everyone except me, lol. 24.6" this winter a bit above normal so far, although not a given that we get to 29" (my 30 yr avg starting in 93)...

No idea, was in grad school at RU then and wasn't keeping weather records...

2.0, 2.4, 2.9, 6.0 and 11.25 - we've been pretty lucky apart from losing 3-4" from that subsidence band on 2/12, but that was more than offset by being in the death band yesterday...

So somehow in what has been a crappy winter for many we've overperformed on almost every storm... the 11.25" yesterday brings me to 24.5" for the season which is actually ahead of normal for this date. It's just nuts that we're 17" ahead of CPK, just 25 miles to our NE. I'll take it and run lol.

Snow ratio time. I thought it was 15-20:1, but we actually got 22:1 - damn! Got 11798 cc of snow melted down to just 530 cc of liquid, so the 11.25" was only 0.5" QPF.

I used a broom but over 3 clearings through the night.

Not sure if posted yet... what a gradient.. from 12" in Bridgewater to 4" in Bernard's over 6 miles...

I did wake up for a few around 9.30 am and we had about another 1/4" that had fallen sometime after 8 am, so my final total is 11.25"... also saw that someone else in Metuchen has reported 10.9" around 7 am when I had 11" and plenty of 10-12" reports from NB, edison, etc. I'm pretty sure this is the biggest positive bust I can remember, at least in my 31 years in Metuchen. Jan 1987 is probably the other biggest +bust I can recall or maybe Feb 83. I will have snow ratio data in a few hours (melting takes awhile).

Here's a pic of my semi-final measurement (one more moderate band coming thru)

As of about 5.50 am the snow band finally petered out and I measured 11.0" for a paltry 1" in the last hour - usually i would kill fire that lol. Could still get another inch over the next few hours but the main event is over. Saw 12" retorted in Readington and plenty of 10+" amounts in CNJ and 9.9" in Metuchen at 5 am which is very close to my 10" at 4.45 am. Really feeling like a once in a lifetime event for a surprise localized major storm and especially getting 2"/hr rates for 5+ hours. Very LES like.

As of 4.45 am we just hit 10"! So 1.75" last hour. Must be at least 15.1 ratio snow... looks like another 30-45 min of heavy snow...

8.25" as of 3.45 am so 2"/hr last 30 min... this is just nuts!

As of 2.45 am we had 6.5" otg so then I shoveled because gorgeous and now as of 3.15 am we have 7.25" so "only" 1.75" last hour... looking at the radar I think 10" is possible.