Thanks for creating a space where us dummies can learn the ins & outs of planning for this.
On one hand, I'm in no way ready to commit in a practical way, but on the other (I'm told) this is one of the grand eclipses, it is in a historically important place,, with climate that makes it ideal, so it seems stupid to miss it. My challenge is to learn enough to make a good decision before access to the whole thing sells out.
(Background: I kick myself for not making an effort to see the 2017 eclipse, which we chose to only watch as a partial from our home. We have signed up to see the 2024 eclipse, because of that regret, in Texas with Astro Trails (UK), because of their itinerary and references, and being terrified we'd screw it up on our own. So I'd prefer to wait and see if I'm a "one and done" guy or become "hooked" before considering further trips, especially expensive ones to places Americans haven't always been welcome in recent years. But... since tours are already offered, one, at least, has already sold out, and Luxor only has a population of ~422K so I figure it has limited resources and waiting probably isn't a realistic option.)
Thanks for all the information and perspectives!
You do not have to make a big financial commitment yet to reserve yourself a space on a 2027 tour. We are booked on an Astro Trails tour to Luxor in 2027, but it only cost us 50 pounds apiece to reserve a space now. Although they have detailed tours planned, they won't even have the prices until 2025 because they have to protect themselves (not knowing what inflation might do to prices over the next 4.5 years). So, since they don't yet have prices, they are not asking for large sums of money yet. But you can protect yourself by reserving a space now.
Brian McGee, the owner of Astro Trails, is very active on the Solar Eclipse Mailing List and he comes across as very knowledgeable about the travel difficulties of getting to various sites such as the isolated peninsula in Western Australia next month.
Something that new eclipse-chasers may not realize is that eclipses repeat after 18 years 10.3 days. The 0.3 days is important because it means that the path shifts one-third of the way around the globe -- the upcoming 2024 totality in North America is the repeat of the one that many of us saw in 2006 in the Sahara in Libya (best weather prospects and a longer duration) and in my case Turkey (an incredibly beautiful country).
In this 18-year cycle of eclipses we are just finishing the seven-year dry period of mostly short totalities: 2017 was 2m40s; 2019 was 4m33s in the South Pacific, but only 2m33s when it reached land in Chile; 2020 was 2m10s; 2021 was 1m54s; and 2023 next month will be only 1m16s.
But beginning in 2024 we get mostly longer durations of totality: 2024 will be 4m28s; yes 2026 is only 2m18s; but 2027 will be 6m23s; 2028 5m10s; and 2030 will be 3m44s. Then we start getting short totalities again in 2031 and 2033.
It is the luck of the draw that in the current saros cycles that we are having, that the two longest durations in an 18 year period are in consecutive years, in this case 2027 and 2028, although both of those are getting a little shorter each time they repeat. For example, 1991 was 6m53s, 2009 was 6m39s, and 2027 will be 6m23s.
Edited by Alan D. Whitman, 17 March 2023 - 11:40 AM.
