Pancake Fly-in

Lately I've been hanging out at the airport a lot, flying, learning about the engine on my plane and soaking up all the knowledge and comraderie that I can. I am loving it as it feeds one of my passions. I've been introduced to a number of different pilots and planes and without a doubt, I am in my element. This is a part of me that flies solo (excuse the pun) and in the past I have resisted because I felt that it took a lot of time away from home, especially when I spend at least one full weekend day either flying or just hanging out, but it is something I need, so I am making that shift in my world. I work most week days, sometimes I blow off a friday to get my life done, but it hit me a couple of weeks ago when I was running through the grocery store at 9:45 p.m. trying to do a month's worth of shopping before the store closed at 10:00 that I need to balance life out better. So to that end, I am building in the time for me to do what I need to do in order to be happy and not feel like life is steam rolling over me. I must say, it is definitely working. That's not to say that everyone at home is happy, or that everything at home is getting done, but I think most everyone will find a way to adjust. There, I feel better....

Today, I got up at 4:30 a.m. ( so I could get a walk in with the dogs) in order to be at the airport by 7:00. This is the annual Kelly Airpark Pancake Breakfast fly-in. My buddy Joe (the guy with the WWII Planes) flew down with me. He had never been in my plane, so I was super excited to fly with him. We got to Kelly, a quick 25 minute flight and got in line to land with about 7 other planes, that was thrilling! As soon as I landed, I heard someone say over the radio (Rich, my friend at Kelly) "Nice Landing Ann" which made feel pretty darn good. Here is a picture of my plane on the flight line, yep its the pretty blue and white one N373WD.

I heard there were between 40 and 45 planes there, all different kinds, which means all different kinds of people, most of them looking at planes and talking about flying. I met up with Pete, the sales guy for the new carbon fiber Super Cub, it's the smaller yellow plane. He took me up for a test flight and it was SO MUCH FUN! Much different from my plane, it has big balloon tires so you can land it anywhere and we did, right out in a pasture in the middle of a bunch of cows. Then we turned around and took off the same way. How awesome is that to just land a plane anywhere? It would be too fun to have one of these to just tool around the desert in. The price is only a measley $163k...The big yellow beast on the right is a T-6, great plane and awesome to just look at.

I wish I would have taken a picture of Rich and Dana, the hosts of the breakfast, friends of mine and all around quality people. I fly with Rich, he's been my instructor for a few years now and this week we are going to be working on crosswind 1 wheel landings...woohoo! I can hardly wait.....

After we finished with breakfast, I got to show off my plane to people walking around looking at all the planes, I was a pretty proud gal to say the least. Then Joe and I hopped back in and flew with all the rest of the Saturday flying Yups back to Centennial. It was like flying in a beehive there were so many planes, not my idea of a great time, but it all worked out. Then we just hung out and tried to discover the true meaning of life...it was a beautiful morning.