Booked up: Area's campgrounds, hotels slated to be filled by eclipse tourists

While a major boon to the local economy, Monday’s eclipse also is posing unprecedented challenges to tourism-industry professionals.

“At this point, everything is sold out,” Cape Girardeau Convention and Visitors Bureau executive director Brenda Newbern said. “And campgrounds are filled; RV camps are filled. Our hotels have been full for several months.”

The demand for lodging is so high and began so early, Missouri’s state parks elected to alter their reservation policies for the dates surrounding the event to allow for reservations more than six months in advance.

Steve Schell, Trail of Tears State Park spokesman, said people have capitalized on the opportunity.

His campsites — 18 with electricity, plus another 30 or so for tents — are booked.

Ten of the tent sites are first-come, first-served, and at least one already is claimed by campers who plan to camp through the day of the eclipse just to save their spot.

Those campers weren’t there Wednesday morning, but St. Louis resident and amateur astronomer Brian Dufaux and his wife Debbie were set up at a nearby campsite, high-powered telescope in tow.

“I’ve been looking forward to this (eclipse) for over 10 years,” Brian said.

The Dufauxes said they’re camping on private property near Gray’s Summit, Missouri, and are relieved to avoid the scramble for accommodations.

“Every state park in Missouri is booked up,” Brian said. “They’ve been booked up for over a year.”

Newbern said it’s the same story with everyone she’s spoken with: Everyone offering lodging is pushed to the max.

That, she said, has proved taxing.

She said the best estimate she’s heard is 1 million out-of-state tourists will visit Missouri for the event, but she’s not found a way to determine how many of those will end up in Cape Girardeau.

“There’s no RSVP,” she said.

Asked whether she was frustrated, Newbern just laughed.

“Yes. Very. It is frustrating ... and when you’re used to planning events and you want success and you want to be able to have a wonderful experience, how do you do that when you don’t even know who’s showing up?”

Newbern said sold-out bookings have happened in the past, but with more familiar structure.

She and other event organizers have worked for more than a year to replicate some of that structure by hosting events at Southeast Missouri State University, the Cape Girardeau SportsPlex and the River Campus.

But she said the what-ifs still are daunting, including that unspeakable contingency: cloud cover.

She said it’s something she has to consider and try to anticipate.

“If we wake up that morning and it’s cloudy ... those people will probably jump in their cars at 3 a.m. when they see that weather forecast,” she said.

Not Dafaux, though.

He said he knows of people who purchased airline tickets just in case of poor weather, but he decided against doing so himself.

Instead, after a decade of anticipation, if a cloud cheats him that rare view, “I’ll cry,” he said, smiling. “I will weep.”

tgraef@semissourian.com

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