I wasn’t disappointed by the weather. Sunny with broken clouds provided a bright, magnificent day – so much sun that I got burnt (forgot the sunscreen!).  I didn’t spend too much time at the static exhibits since I arrived at the show just as the aerial portion was just beginning – a Czech built Albatross was flying as I entered the grounds.

Highlights of the show

I usually go to air shows for the rip and tear of the air as jet aircraft scream by and I wasn’t disappointed by this show.  I  really enjoyed the Navy/Marine heritage flight.  The F-18 put on quite an individual show.  At the end of the F-18 show, the two aircraft paired up while in flight and did  several fly-bys in front of the crowd.  In all of the shows I’ve been at, I’ve never seen a WWII Corsair in flight – it was great!  After several photo passes, the Corsair came in for a landing.  As the craft was slowing down after landing, the F-18 screamed over the top in a high speed fly-by that excited the crowd.

The AH-64 Apache helicopter and the Sea Harrier also put on good shows.  The Apache cruised up and down the flight line showing off its capabilities.  The Sea Harrier flew as a normal plane does in flight but then it also transitioned to vertical flight.  I’ve seen several different Harrier versions in flight and it never ceases to amaze me how an aircraft can transition from straight flight into a vertical mode.

Towards the end of the show, a B1-B did a series of fly-bys before coming in to land at the airport.  This aircraft flew from  its base in Texas to put on the show in Rockford.  The B1-B come in low and slow with the wings extended and then did a couple high speed passes with the wings swept back.  It’s always amazing to see how long it takes for an aircraft of this size – traveling at high speed – takes to turn around.

Lastly, the F-22 put on a HECK of a show.  If you look at some of the pictures I got, you’ll see that it was able to pull vapor off of its wing and controlling panel surfaces.  It is an amazing aircraft.  This plane combines stealth, supersonic speed and a high tech weapons system into one lethal airplane.  Toward the end of its solo performance, the F-22 paired up with  P-51 Mustang for an Air Force heritage flight.

Lowlights of the show

One of the things that bugged me about the Rockford AirFest is that they have pavilions from sponsoring companies that obscure the view of the runway and flight line.  While I can understand the need and desire to keep sponsors happy and reward them in some way, there has to be some way to do it so that all paying participants can fully enjoy the show.

But I’ll probably be back – maybe not next year,but I’ll be back.  Check out my gallery of images from the Rockford AirFest!

One of the animals that I didn’t see in Denali was a moose.  Not surprising since in three trips up, I’ve only seen a moose in the wild once (the cow moose and the two calves in Homer).  I was bound a determined to get a picture if I saw one.  Well, I failed on the picture taking but I did see two bull moose as we rode down the rails.  One moose was startled by the train and was running alongside a lake front.  By the time I could get my camera into play, it wasn’t visible from my position.  Then my sister was joking with me that there was a moose in the meadow out her window (she was having some fun with me) but her boyfriend actually spotted the rack of a bull moose.  Sure enough, there was a moose out her window.  So I did see two bull moose, but alas, no pictures.  I also wanted to get a picture off of the Hurricane Gulch bridge.  This 900+ foot bridge covers a span that is almost 300 feet deep.  I was able to get a few shots of this breath-taking view.  As we rolled along, the railroad employees told us about some of the things that were passing by outside.  I think that the team on the Denali-Anchorage trip did a better job than the Anchorage-Denali crew did.   Because of this narration I was able to see a beaver dam that was over 75 years old, got some history on how the railroad was built and I now understand how to list out the types of Alaskan salmon.

There were other things I was trying to capture with my camera.  One was the amount of ferns along the way, but those are hard to photograph as you’re moving at speed down the rails.  We passed fields of ferns that lined each side of the track.  When you think of Alaska, you think of cold and snow, but the southern part of Alaska is actually a temperate rain forest.  The ferns grow there naturally and in abundance.  Another thing that caught my attention was the amount of erractics that I saw, particularly in the rivers.  An erratic is a large boulder that a glacier just dropped.  Also along the way we saw beaver dams, lots of fireweed and just some simply beautiful settings with the sky and mountains.

As we moved south, the skies started to clear but they didn’t clear fully.  This allowed me to take some more dramatic photos as we neared Anchorage.  The clouds were still low in the sky and brushed over the tops of the mountains outside of Anchorage.  Slowly we worked our way into the city, past Elmendorf Air Force Base and into the Alaska Railroad depot.  It was nice to get out of the train and stretch but it was also a little sad since I had so much fun and valued the experiences I had with my sister in Denali.  After being denied a pizza at a popular restaurant in town (it was still packed with people waiting to get in at 8:30) we went back to my sister’s place and had sandwiches and chips for dinner.

As we ate, I thought about how I needed to pack, because my flight back home left the next day.  I needed to make sure I could fit all the souvenirs I picked up for my wife and kids in my bag since I was at my limit.  Shortly, the day ended with my sister and her boyfriend heading to sleep since they had to work the next day.  I have one last adventure planned before I leave Alaska and I soon hit the hay myself so I had enough energy for that as well as the long flight home.

On Sunday, we got up at 5 AM to get ready and to be at the dock for 5:45. We made it and were soon on Born Free, a fishing charter boat. Our day was just starting. After about a 90 minute run into the Cook Inlet, we were able to drop anchor and start to fish. Now wrangling a fishing pole with a three pound lead weight on the end might sound easy, but in practice it’s a different matter. We dropped our lines overboard and let them descend down to about 250 to 275 feet. We then waited for the nibbles. Soon, fish started appearing on board as one person after another started to reel them in. I caught 8 fish total, and kept three of them (we could keep six total since each angler could keep two). It was quite the experience and I’m having some of the catch shipped home.

Once finished fishing, we had lunch, saw a few more sights and then headed back to my sister’s place in Anchorage. I have the start of a gallery for this trip started here. Take a look and leave a comment!

Photos courtesy of NASA

We can argue about it today, but yes Neil Armstrong’s quote wasn’t as all-inclusive as we’d use today.  For his time though, it worked.  It conveyed the awesome scope of the occasion.

Today, July 20, 2009 marks the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.  This feat marks the highlight of mankind’s scientific achievement to date.  The sheer effort involved in pulling the moon landing off consumed lives and treasure while captivating the minds of the world.

The success of this endeavor made instant heroes of the men who made the trip to the moon.  Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins will forever be tied to this event.  Over time, they have capitalized on their notoriety and made names for themselves or they have let the fame that they gained for just performing their job affect their lives and relationships.  Who can say how the rest of us would have performed.  I don’t know how my life would have been affected by peering into the black void of space, setting foot on an alien body and then looking back onto the blue marble of Earth.

What I do know is that it didn’t take too long before moon landings were viewed as commonplace; where we thought more about the products that came about as a result of Apollo – like Teflon – than the actual feat of the lunar landing itself.  Once we had “been there, done that” we lost interest and thus killed the dream that we strived so hard to achieve.  You have to wonder what Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins think privately about the lack of effort, the lack of will.  So, what happened, what diverted us from the course that we had charted for ourselves once JFK stated that we were going to the moon?  There were many issues but I think the most important are:

• Lack of leadership – what passes for leadership in this country is fairly poor.  We’re better emulating the Romans (make sure they have their read and circuses) than making people see that there are tough choices to be made in life.  Leadership in this country failed the country, became embroiled in wars that had no lasting difference and pandered to the basest desires of the populace.

• Willingness to be taken for the ride – the American populace failed in their obligation to be informed and educated.  We have sunk to new lows in this country when it comes to education.   Other countries now are hurriedly taking up where we left off – Indians, Chinese and others are looking not only to return to the moon but are also talking about colonizing it.  They have the critical systems in place to do it too.  They value education, they encourage students to learn and grow and they capitalize on the investment.  America should learn this lesson and stop settling for public school systems that simply pass students through.  Education is not a cost, it IS an investment.

• No sense of purpose – I’m probably going to get reamed for this but the Baby Boomers have left us a legacy of individualism.  An individualism that is so strong it borders on national narcissism.  These were the people who rebelled in the 60s, fueled the 70s with sex and drugs, made excessive greed popular in the 80s, and fostered the over-the-top 90s.  They gave us the “I’ve got mine, you can get yours” attitude, with no thought about the better good, sacrifice or the future.  The Baby Boomers have had their run, now it’s time to turn our attention to giving America a vision, correcting the course of the ship – it’s time to get back to the business of America.

So what can be done?  Well, nothing simple, that’s for sure.  It’s going to take a lot of work, none of it easy.  It’s going to involve hard choices and difficult decisions.  First off, we have to recognize that now matter who we are – the color of our skin, the language that we speak, our economic class, our orientation – we are first and foremost Americans.  We can no longer afford to be divisive.  The politicians and the pundits have made this the easy route because that takes the heat off of them.  Instead we need to see the future of our children and work now to make it better.

We need to look out for ourselves and our families without a doubt, but it should be tempered with the realization of our need to invest in coming generations.  We are providing the foundation for them to learn, grow, and succeed.  We cannot take it for granted that they will have good lives just because that’s the way it’s always been.  We have real competition out there, people and countries are aiming for our standard of living and they are gaining ground fast!

Lastly, we need to be united and aligned.  We need to hold our politicians to a higher standard.  We need to expect more out of ourselves.  We need to understand that we can make a difference and work toward changing our country and society at every chance we have.

Laterness.

The day I went was the Warbird airshow. That means that all sorts of vintage, restored aircraft from WW II through Vietnam was flying during the airshow. The day was great – not too hot, and mostly sunny. There was a threat of a storm but that passed to the north. During the day I got to see a flyby by some F-15s and I got to see the F-22 in action. It is amazing how close you can get to some of the aircraft.

Anyway, enjoy the images. Leave comments if you feel like it. Also, check out the EAA AirVenture 2008 video page – I took some video with my digital camera. The quality is good, but a little bouncy – I didn’t bring a tripod. Enjoy!

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Anyway, we spent our time just seeing they sights, taking a “staycation.”  We took an architectural cruise down the Chicago River, spent some time at Navy Pier, went up in the Sears Tower.  We did the touristy things too – we went to Millennium Park, walked up and down Michigan Avenue, went to go see “Wicked”, and visited the Lincoln Park Zoo among other things.  We ate at some of our favorite places – Rock Bottom Brewery and Goose Island.

Overall, we had a lot of fun in the middle of the summertime.  Just us as a family in the big city.

Enjoy the pictures, feel free to leave comments on the ones you like the most.

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It was a beautiful day – sunny and not humid.  When I first arrived, the buffalo were in there pen area and I thought I was out of luck.  But once I got out of the car and moved closer to the fence, the buffalo came out, almost as if to say – hey, we have a visitor.  If you look at the picture above, you can see this one keeping an eye on me.

It was fun to see the young ones following their mothers and the bulls just sauntering around.  I watched for a little while and then headed out to see my daughter.

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What was fun was that the re-enactment portrayed the Battle of Brandy Station.  I was able to walk this battlefield last August.  You can see my pictures of the actual battle site here.  This was the first time that I can remember that the Big Battle was fashioned after an actual battle.  Most of the times, the battle showed the was the armies fought and some of the tactics they used.  I thought this years battle was pretty interesting becuase I could put some frame of reference around it, but I’m not sure how others viewed it.  I know my son liked it because he got to see the reenactment and was able to see the cannons fire.  All in all, a good time was had by the two of us.

This is a great event put on by the Lake County IL Forest Preserve district.  If you’ve never been, you should go!  Also, a heaping big thanks to all of the reenactors who devote their time to protraying this important time in our country’s history.  Here is a list of the participating units:

• 8th Illinois Cavalry
• 13th Tennessee Infantry
• 104th Illinois Infantry
• 154th Tennessee Infantry
• Crescent City Benevolent Society
• Taylor’s Battery
• Battery G

If you like the pictures below, please leave a comment!

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