Upstate hotels booked, some overbooked on eve of solar eclipse

Looking for a hotel room on the eve of the solar eclipse in the Upstate? Most visitors might be out of luck. 

Most, if not all, hotels in the Greenville area are booked and overbooked that Sunday, the day before the big day on Aug. 21.

Meaning there’s a wait list to get in, and visitors will be lucky if someone cancels their trip.

Two hotels in the county offering discounted eclipse rates are Courtyard by Marriott in downtown Greenville and Hampton Inn in Travelers Rest.

A representative with Courtyard, which is offering an eclipse viewing party, said the hotel has for some time been booked on Aug. 20. While overbooked, a Hampton Inn representative said there is room availability the night of Aug. 21, the day of the eclipse.

Hotels near the Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport and hotels on some of Greenville’s busiest roads, like La Quinta Inn and Suites on Haywood Road, are booked up, too.

Laura Connell, leisure travel and community outreach marketing coordinator for VisitGreenvilleSC, said the visitor’s bureau has heard that most hotels are sold out for Aug. 20, particularly those stretched across downtown.

But don’t get completely discouraged.

Connell encourages hopeful visitors to get on a hotel’s waiting list just in case a room does become available.

In Anderson, where the full eclipse will last more than two and a half minutes starting at 2:37 p.m., hotels have been sold out for several weeks.

Billy Birdwell, spokesman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, said he booked his room in Anderson for a viewing from atop the corps’ Hartwell Dam months ago.

“I’ve been waiting for this all my life,” Birdwell said.

The Upstate has hundreds of campsites in Anderson, Oconee and Pickens counties as well as those in northeast Georgia. From Tallulah Falls, Georgia, to Mountain Rest, all are booked. About a dozen campgrounds along the shores of Lake Hartwell and nearby Lake Russell are also full.  

Glenn Brill, director of the Anderson County Recreation Department, said he is starting to refer people inquiring about rooms to Spartanburg, where an edge of the county’s west side will have a view of the eclipse.

He said the eclipse is the biggest event the area has ever seen on a non-football August weekend, “by a large scale.”

More:Greenville, Anderson prepare for total solar eclipse

“Two million people are coming to South Carolina for the eclipse,” Brill said. “There will be an additional 200,000 cars in Anderson that day just because of the eclipse.”

Though you cannot park overnight at the Anderson Civic Center, where the county is hosting one of its two eclipse parties, you can park there as early as 4 a.m. on the day of the event, Brill said. The county is also hosting a viewing at Green Pond Landing on Hartwell Lake, where the gates will open at 8 a.m.

Other daytime viewing spots in Anderson County include the city of Anderson’s recreation center and Wren Park, the Belton Center for the Arts, Denver Downs Farm, the Jockey Lot flea market and the Blue Jar Barn.

Jason Outman, executive director of Experience Columbia SC, said his visitor’s bureau has conducted an informal survey of hotels around town, and all were booked on the Sunday before the eclipse. They were at about 90-percent occupancy on that Monday.

Outman said, though, that this survey represented just a small sample of the capital city’s 126 hotels. Customers might get lucky, he said, if they call hotels directly to find a room.

“What we have been told is unfortunately if people are going to Expedia or Travelocity, for the most part the hotels have removed availability from those sites,” Outman said. “The way hotels work is they only put in a certain percentage of rooms on these sites that they want help with to sell. For a big event like this they don’t need help from a third-party booking engine.”

Another option for those visiting Columbia for the eclipse is the State Fair Grounds, which has parking for more than 4,000 cars. At the site, visitors can sign up for a space to park their RV for a fee of $125.

In Charleston, meanwhile, where the eclipse is expected to cross about 2:48 p.m. Monday, hotels are also booked.

The Charleston Visitor’s Bureau is seeing about a 90 percent occupancy rate through the weekend of the eclipse, a representative said.

Most hotels on the Bureau’s website list “SOLD OUT” for that night.