Home for Christmas: Let it snow

This month has been different for me flying. To be able to get Christmas off I had to bid for reserve flying. That means rather than having a regular schedule I have had to be on call. The way that works is I carry around my flight gear and uniform and when the company calls I have to go and fly. I felt a little like Clark Kent. My phone would ring and literally I would have to jump into a phone booth and put on my uniform and fly away. The trips I would fly were mainly into areas that had been affected by weather and had cancelations like the East coast this last week. The company puts on more flying to catch up after the weather prohibits the original flights from operating. ( My Changing Facility) Usually the back seat of the van as Karen drives me to the airport. Kind of like a phone both.

I am home now for Christmas and so happy. I have spent many Christmases alone in a hotel. I am savoring every minute. I wish each one of you no matter where you are a very Merry Christmas! Don't forget to track Santa. The Northern American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) tracks Santa every year. You can watch him deliver presents too! www.noradsanta.org

Back at it.

Well back at it. It was so nice to be home for Thanksgiving. It was very special. I miss you all so much.

This has been a busy trip. Not much time to do anything but fly and sleep. This trip has had long 14 hour days. I have been to Ft. Lauderdale, Memphis, DC (twice), Minneapolis three times and Raleigh Durham. I can't wait to get home. The pictures above are about all I have seen for the last three days with the exception of the break I had in Minny where we had lunch together. That was definitely the highlight of the trip, seeing you guys. See ya soon.

The Best Way to Fly

Our Private Jet

We make a good team!

This was the best way to go to work. When I can take my family along. I had a normal trip to New York, Tampa and DC. This trip the flights to and from DC were wide open with plenty of open seats and I was scheduled to have the day in DC free from duty. That gave us the day in DC. Karen and Austin came along and it was very special. I loved having them with me. We flew out to DC in the evening and they got to come up to the cockpit before we left and see my office and even got to talk on the flight attendants PA system. Austin loved being in the cockpit with me and I loved having him with me.

When I was walking around the aircraft performing the preflight inspection I looked up in one of the windows to see my beautiful wife looking out and blowing me a kiss. I will remember that moment for ever. It was so special having her on a flight I was flying. Definitely one of my all time highlights.

The Wild West

Crazy Wrabbits

The start of the day was early and as I was walking around the aircraft doing my preflight on the airplane I had to take a double take. There was a bunch of Wild Rabbits (Scary). They were on their way out West. I guess they needed a change from the boring Midwest. They were headed out to the Wild West. When I got back on the airplane the owners of the scary rabbits wanted to make sure they made it on the airplane. This is the picture I had taken so I showed them their crazy wrabbits were with us.

It was the last day of the trip and I was headed out West to San Diego and the route we take is one of my favorites. You fly over the Rocky Mountains and continue on through the desert in Nevada and over the Grand Canyon. It is so beautiful! The Rockies were especially beautiful today as the clouds were slightly below the mountain tops. Denver had just received a lot of snow and it was very scenic.

The Rockies

The Grand Canyon

Milwaukee

It is a cloudy day today in Milwaukee but flying in I saw a unique building on the skyline. I found this picture to show you. It is the Art Museum downtown. I am staying close by it today. The top part that looks like a whales tail or ships tail, is part of the roof that twice a day opens up like wings. Very cool. The temperature today is cool and it is very cloudy.

It was an early get up today at 3am when I left Boston. This trip has had all early departures which is wearing me out. It is hard to make yourself go to bed early. I feel like a senior citizen. I get the early bird special at dinner because I eat at 4 and then in bed by 8 pm. Yee Haw I am living it up. One more day of early get ups and then I am sleeping in. I fly to Minneapolis then on to San Diego and then back tomorrow. Long day but I can't wait to see ya.

I'll have the seniors special please!

Boston

It is hard to believe less than 24 hours ago I was siting on the beach with my beautiful wife. It was quick at home and out on the road.

The trip to the Keys was an amazing get away. Our room was on the beach and as you can see from the top picture you could walk off our porch to the beach. It was so much fun!

It was so hard to go back to work. As you can see it was a little colder and grey in Boston. The leaves are changing and it is a beautiful color. I think though to be honest I like the first picture better.

Well another day and off to Milwaukee tomorrow. Then on to San Diego and Home. The best place of all. (Home)

See ya soon!

History Lesson NWA

Northwest Airlines was founded on September 1, 1926 by Colonel Lewis Brittin, under the name Northwest Airways, a reference to the historical name for the Northwest Territory. Like other early airlines, Northwest's focus was not in hauling passengers, but in flying mail for the U.S. Post Office Department. The fledgling airline established a mail route between Minneapolis and Chicago, using open cockpit biplanes.

Northwest began flying passengers in 1927. In 1928, the airline started its first international route with service to Winnipeg (Canada). The airline's operations were expanded to smaller cities in the region by the end of the decade. In 1931, Northwest sponsored Charles and Anne Lindbergh on a pioneering flight to Japan, scouting what would become known as the Northwest Airlines Great Circle route, and proving that flying via Alaska could save as much as 2,000 miles on a New York City-Tokyo route. In 1933, Northwest was designated to fly the Northern Transcontinental Route from New York City to Seattle, Washington. It adopted the name of Northwest Airlines the following year.

During World War II, Northwest joined the war effort by flying military equipment and personnel from the continental United States to Alaska. During this time, Northwest began painting its aircraft tails red as a visual aid in the often harsh weather conditions. The airline's experience with the severe northern climate led the government to designate Northwest as the United States' main North Pacific carrier following World War II. That is why we still have the Red Tails today. We also still carry troops back and forth to hot spots all over the world today.

On July 15, 1947, Northwest became the first airline to operate a commercial passenger flight from the U.S.A. to Japan and Northwest remains the largest non-Japanese carrier at Tokyo Narita Airport, with flights to several cities in Far East Asia as well as in South East Asia.

Northwest meteorologists pioneered the first clear-air turbulence forecasting system in 1957, important since the airline flew many northern routes over turbulence-prone mountain areas. Northwest remains a leader in turbulence prediction, providing TPAWS (turbulence prediction and warning services) to other airlines still today.

November 1st our aircraft shifts over totally to Delta Airlines and we come to an end of an era. Northwest has a rich history with many pioneering firsts in the airline industry. It has been very cool to work with them and move into the future. It is hard to imagine flying back in the early years over Alaska into Japan with minimal navigation equipment and operations. I thought as we move forward it would be cool to look at the past.

This picture shows the combining of the two airlines. Notice the Red Tail on the Airbus. It is still with the Northwest branding. It moves into a new logo with Delta. If you look closely at the picture of the wings the bottom set of wings are Northwest wings. They have "Air Mail" written on them as that is where Northwest got their start. The middle set of wings are those of old Delta and the top set of wings are the new Delta. Notice the color change to red. Delta incorporated the rich heritage of the Red Tail into the new Delta.

It is sad to see such a strong legacy airline name go away. It has been around for over 80 years. Quite a accomplishment in the ups and downs of an airline environment, but I am looking forward to the future with Delta. They are a good airline with an employee friendly environment. On to another chapter in life.

Rock Star

This was our sweet ride this morning in Sacramento. Normally we ride in a very average van but today we are Rock Stars. I walked out to get in the van and saw this huge limo and wondered who was taking that and why in the world would they be going at this hour. It was 0530 in the morning. If I was a Rock Star I would go like 1100. Well it was for us. We hopped in and drove to the airport and everyone we passed, (all 3 people on the road at that time) looked in and wondered what star would emerge. Well sorry to disappoint you it is just your Rock Star pilots. Yeeee Haww. I am not sure how cool I looked climbing out of the limo that sits so low to the ground I almost split my pants trying to crawl out and then knocked my hat off practically falling out on the ground. I think I need to practice my stage entrance. Oh well next time. It was fun while it lasted.

See ya soon!

Let it snow

Well the summer is actually over. WHAT A BUMMER! We start into the long winter months.

The first picture tells it all. Dark and snowy.

This picture is the empty parking lot to Valley Fair. The local amusement park. Summer is over. It went by too fast! Things are starting to wind down.

This picture is flying over the zoo. So many animals are in a wild environment where you could not see them. I can see the huge aquarium. Have you seen or touched any monkeys? Ill bet there is one in there.

The snow has been flying and here we go. Today we flew out to Sacramento, California. Our route takes us over the Bighorn Mountain in Wyoming. They actually have a town there called Crazy Woman! I laugh every time I fly over. Duh (Just kidding)

This lake is one of the largest in the States. It is in Nevada, close to Reno and is called Pyramid Lake. It is very salty and not really for swimming. Lake Tahoe is close by and is the resort to go to for swimming. That is the place I climbed the mountain. It is very beautiful there but Pyramid Lake area looks deserted and very desolate.

On to Minny and Bismarck and then home. See ya soon!

Sonnys!!!

Guess what I ate? You guessed it Sonnys! Nana came down from the Villages and had dinner with me. It was awesome. I ate until I was about to be ill. We had a good time.

Today I am in Hartford Connecticut. No Sonnys. Bummer. The leaves are just starting to turn and it is sunny and 63. I am here for today and getting some work done. Tomorrow off to Minny and out to Billings Montana and back. See ya shortly.

A very gusty day in New York

YEEEEEE HAAAAA!

My last landing in New York! (Just kidding). It was so windy in New York today. The winds were at the absolute max the aircraft could safely land in. Everyone was having to go around because the winds exceeded the max. Once the winds would die down enough we could come in and land. Needles to say we got caught in the conga line and ended up being over a hour late today. It was a wild ride in all the bumps. The winds were over 39 knots. That is just under 50 miles per hour. Yippy Ki Yay!

We were able to get out of there and on to Tampa. It was much nicer in Florida.

This is an area just South of Tampa. Many ships come in and off load and pick up their materials. The city is to the middle right.

Here is a better picture of downtown Tampa. It was so nice to see the water and get warmed up.

Here is a picture of an Air Force base called MacDill in Tampa. This is a cool base where Special Forces work and play. This is the place where Mom and I went to the airshow and Mom was in the infamous portapotty! (Remember)

These are some beautiful homes on the Gulf. It would be very exciting to live on the water. What a view.

Well another early morning and on to Connecticut tomorrow.

See ya soon!

On the Runway

Most of my flights lately have been quick, so I am back before I can post the sights I have seen for ya.

This last trip was cool though into New York again. We landed in Newark, New Jersey and had to take a limo drive to New York (JFK) for a morning departure. It took almost 2 hours to drive it. It was rush hour traffic and stop and go. Very boring! But we did go over the George Washington bridge which crosses the Hudson river. That is the bridge Captain Sully flew over when he landed his Airbus on the Hudson river. To the left is New York city and straight ahead on the water is where he landed.

The next picture is sitting on the runway in New York JFK waiting to take off. Straight ahead is the city. Really cool. Look at the building at the end of the runway. You don't want to run off the end do ya? It looks pretty weird heading toward it.

The city is so large it is amazing how many buildings there are. It looks like a sea of buildings.

Boston with Nicole

I was flying s trip which included a long overnight in Boston. I asked Nicole if she wanted to come with me and she said she would love to. Boston is one of my favorite cities to visit. It is rich in history. She can fly free and there were plenty of seats or so it seemed until the weather came into Boston and flights started getting delayed. My flight filled up and there were only 3 seats left and she was 3 on the list. She got on and I was thrilled until a passenger could not get their seat as the agent had put 2 people in the same seat. You guessed it they had to pull Nicole off the flight. We were heart broken, but there was another flight. It ran late as well and she did not get into Boston until midnight. I picked her up and we went to sleep to be woken up at 430 by fire alarms and sirens. Our hotel alarms were going off and we had to evacuate the building. A story in its self. Turned out there was not a fire and the firemen gave us the ok to go back in after 20 minutes standing outside in the rain. You could not believe what we saw people wearing. The next day was great and we had a wonderful day touring the city. Here are some great pictures of our day.

Our Hotel

On the Trolley in Boston. It was sprinkling today so we took a tour of the city by trolley. It was so much fun. We saw so many cool places. Our tour guide was a retired history teacher and taught us so much about the history of the city.

This was Kings cemetery. Paul Revere was buried here as well as John Hancock and the Franklin family.

This was at the start of the Freedom Trail. This statue was in front of the State House.

This is the home of Paul Revere. He raised 16 children in this home. He had 8 children from his first wife who died. He remarried and had 8 more. Wow! I guess his second wife was very competitive.

The road home

Well today was a early day in Memphis. We flew to New York and then on home to Minneapolis. We landed today to the South in New York, which means you fly up the Hudson river over the Statue of Liberty and circle the city to land. It is very neat flying so close to the city. Seems a little weird being so close to this very large city and seeing the twin towers site. New York is also so busy it is a little crazy talking to the controllers and landing in this very crowded airport.

This is the Statue of Liberty. Kind of fuzzy, it was bumpy coming in.

New York City downtown. The open area is where the Twin Towers stood.

This is upper New York where the Empire State building is located. As you can see it is a huge area packed with buildings.

This is an amusement park just North of the city.

See ya soon!

Change of scenery

(I took this picture yesterday on the mall. It is such a cool place to visit).

Today started out early in DC. The sun was just coming up as we took to the sky and headed for Memphis. I had been looking everywhere for Elvis but little did I know he was under glass at the airport in Memphis. He wouldn't sign an autograph. (Whats up with that)?

Then it was on to Cancun. We were just flying down and turning around and coming back. I wanted to take you all and hang out on the beach. The beaches are just beautiful. We will have to make a trip there! Look at how blue the water is.

Well I must get some rest. It was along day. Tomorrow we fly to New York and then home. See ya soon.