Florida, Washington and more: People who came hundreds or thousands of miles to watch eclipse here

Nick Kirch of Kennewick, Washington, is celebrating his 65th birthday by watching the total eclipse Monday at the National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which anticipated as many as 35,000 visitors to watch the eclipse.

Kirch, who is staying with his sister who lives in West Chester Twp., said during the 2017 solar eclipse his town was nearly at totality with 96% coverage, but when he learned the next total solar eclipse would happen on his 65th birthday, he started making plans.

”At that point I told my sister ‘I’m making my reservation now to stay at your place and coming to see the eclipse in 2024,’” he said.

Erin Clough — Titusville, Florida

Erin Clough and her family drove nearly 1,000 miles from Titusville, Florida, near the Kennedy Space Center, only stopping at a few places along the way, and arrived around 8:30 a.m. at Carillon Historical Park in Dayton.

“We wanted to see the eclipse, the magic of totality,” she said. “We’ve got friends up here and we decided we were just gonna make it a road trip, see our friends, too.”

Clough describes herself as a “space nerd” and said she finds all the things that happen in space infinitely interesting.

“We live on the space coast so I’m like all in the rocket launches and … we’ve watched the lunar eclipses at home in the middle of the night going outside. We did (solar eclipse) totality in 2017, I wouldn’t want to miss it it. I get another chance, once in a lifetime. Twice.”

Rayle brothers — Greensboro, North Carolina

Brothers Joshua and River Rayle of Greensboro, North Carolina, hatched the plan to come to Dayton to watch the total solar eclipse in the last 16 days.

Joshua Rayle selected the state to visit. “Well, if you, we pulled up the path of totality and Ohio is the closest to North Carolina,” he said.

River Rayle chose Dayton, where they visited the Aullwood Audubon Farm off Frederick Pike.

“I figured Cleveland would be a little too occupied by too many tourists and I’m not that big on people. … Honestly, I kind of like the, the trees and the birds,” he said.

On Sunday the Rayles visited the Air Force museum, which they said was quite impressive.

“Super huge, saw lots of cool stuff,” Joshua Rayle said. “I grew up reading and learning a lot about fighter planes and military aircraft, so it was really cool to see a bunch of that stuff in person.”

Joshua Rayle was wearing a T-shirt he got in South Carolina during the total solar eclipse on Aug. 21, 2017. He said it was “by far the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“The, the only way I can describe it is when the totality happens, it’s like you can see directly into heaven. It just the nature changes, everything changes. … when it happens it’s almost like you change, too,” he said.

Gary Goldberg — Chesapeake Beach, Maryland

Father and son duo Gary and Jake Goldberg, at National Road Commons Park in Springfield, drove about seven hours to view the “once in a lifetime” event, Gary Goldberg said.

Their closest Ohio relative lives in Grove City near Columbus, where arrived Saturday so they wouldn’t be on the road “at the same time with everybody else,” the he said.

The Goldbergs saw the commons park event on Facebook, and said it “meets and exceeds everything” he was expecting, with an enjoyable afternoon of nice weather, music, food trucks, vendors and people.

Gary Goldberg is a computer scientist but said he grew up wanting to be an astronomer, but a fascination for the field ever-present in the back of his mind, he said.

“This is my last chance in my life to experience something that’s outside of the world,” he said.

His excitement extends to his son, who said that those who aren’t as excited for the event and may not watch it will miss out.

“Watching fireworks in a video is not the same thing as being there for it,” Jake Goldberg said.

Gary Goldberg said he is excited that he gets to experience the solar event with his son who “is at the age now where we don’t do very much together.”