The second leg of the journey was the 200 mile hop from Wichita, Kansas to Kansas City, Missouri where we’d reserved a hotel room. The hotel was inside the totality band, but far enough away from the centerline that we were able to find a room due to the number of hotels in the area.

After checking in, we moved North for a scouting mission to the centerline at St. Joseph, MO. We looked at the site I’d selected and then we had some time to kill. No one had a MO geocache yet, so that’s what we did. Well, after eating ice cream anyway. We picked a good one and converted another muggle.

The sunset worried me.

The clouds were starting to build, and the NOAA forecasts were calling for 60% cloud coverage in our area on the 21st. The forecasts showed clouds for a two state radius around us. There were only two directions to go for clear skies along the totality path. East to Kentucky, or West to Wyoming. We were already exhausted. We decided to stay, wait, and see.