Totality on Sutton Mt. 2017/08/21

[Guy]

Opening pic

OK for anyone who is not burnt out on Eclipse reports yet here is ours!

Trouble free travel to Sutton Mt. trailhead on the Sunday, arrived just after lunch and hung out for the afternoon.

About 10 other groups were doing the same thing, there is a rickety wire gate across the entrance to the trailhead which you have to open and close to get in and out we think this old gate kept the crowds down because unless you knew parking was allowed there you would assume it was private land. A few more folks came in during the afternoon and did the same thing but it never got crowded.

Around 5:00pm a ranger showed up but was only concerned about open fires and wanted to make sure we all knew about the extreme fire danger, they had no problem with us camping there.




Eclipse Eve!

Set off the next morning just after 6 for the summit.





By eclipse time I counted about 70 people on top but it was fine and everyone was having a good time.





Plenty of time for setup before the big event!



As others have reported the temperature drop was much more noticeable than I expected.



I wont bore you with a hundred crescent sun shots!





This is looking West at the moment totality hit. (Yes I was looking the wrong way )



During Totality Mt Hood which had been barely visible popped out in the light from the dark summit of Sutton. Looking back west you could see the band of totality with light to the North and light to the South.



I blew my totality shot with the wrong aperture setting letting in too much light, there was no time to reset and take another!


All that remained before heading for back down was a post eclipse toast



Only ran into 1 bad traffic jam essentially a 15 mile tailback from the 4 way stop in the center of Condon! took us about 90 minutes to travel those 15 miles. The good folks of Mayville came out to watch us all slowly crawl by!



As just about everyone else has reported. A wonderful experience!

[pablo]

Neat photos. Hardy crew. Are those sunspots on the first crescent shot? I guess the temperature drop is a thing, I don't recall hearing about it in pre-eclipse talk but I sure felt the difference during totality.

--Paul

[Derwood]

Your shot of the people looking at totality is one of the better photos I've seen of this event. I've seen 800 pictures of a cresent sun, but less than 5 of the reaction. And far more interesting.

[Rather B Hiking]

It is amazing to see so many reports from Sutton Mountain here, when there were so few people there!

Around 5:00pm a ranger showed up but was only concerned about open fires and wanted to make sure we all knew about the extreme fire danger, they had no problem with us camping there.

There were two rangers, and they were in hot pursuit of a truck that was carrying two dirt bikes and some type of grill. They placed a trail cam, hoping to catch them on the way back out. The two bikers came back past the summit area just after totality. On the way down, I noticed that one of the large dead trees across the trail/road had been moved, removing an obstruction that may have been intended to keep ORVs out. I hope the rangers catch those guys!

[Guy]

There were two rangers, and they were in hot pursuit of a truck that was carrying two dirt bikes and some type of grill. They placed a trail cam, hoping to catch them on the way back out. The two bikers came back past the summit area just after totality. On the way down, I noticed that one of the large dead trees across the trail/road had been moved, removing an obstruction that may have been intended to keep ORVs out. I hope the rangers catch those guys!

Correct there were two rangers but they did not arrive in hot pursuit of the bikers. In fact they didn't know about the bikers until we and others who were there told them about the 2 bikes. They arrived at TH on their bikes we saw them riding down the highway then right past were we were camped and they then quickly went up to and around the gate.

After we told the rangers about what we had seen they disappeared up the trail for a while then came back so that's probably when they placed the trail cam. I did not see any kind of grill on the bikes though, and if there was a truck they must have left it some where else because it wasn't at the TH.

We hope they are caught too!