The Secret Weapon of Travelling

I am going to tell you about one of my earliest memories right now. It really isn't all that important of a memory but it sets the stage for what has just happened nearly 40 years later. This memory takes place somewhere around the time when I was between 3 and 4 years old I would guess...and it's a little bit embarrassing. At 3 or 4, I can't really say that my actions were influenced in any way by what people would think of me at 40, but they were totally affected by my imagination running wild and the thrill of the moment.

For the sake of argument, I am going to say that I was 3 because the younger I was in this story, the more acceptable my actions become. Anyway, at the time when I was 3 years old, my mom was into arts and crafts and had big bags of cotton lying around for her little projects. If you have ever done any sewing projects, you may know of the bags that I am talking about. There is just about enough cotton in one of those bags to make a normal sized pillow. At the ripe old age of 3, I wore what every other 3 year old wore...tighty whities...or if I was lucky, Super Friends Underoos. This is where the bags of cotton would come into play. Tighty whities and Underoos are amazingly stretchy. I could stuff a whole bag of cotton into the front of my Underoos and a whole bag of cotton in the rear of my Underoos which would make me look, in my mind anyway, like a car. I would then proceed to run around the house with my stuffed undies making vroom-vroom noises while pretending that I was a race car.

After a few times of the race car zooming around the house, I started jumping off of the furniture. Since cars don't naturally jump off of furniture, I had to adapt my imagination just a little and my stuffed full of cotton tighty-whities quickly became the fuselage of an airplane. For a better effect as I was flying through the air, I would hold onto magazines in my outstretched arms as I leaped off of anything that I could figure out how to climb. The magazines would flap in the wind and I was sure that they would extend my flight times by at least 8 minutes before I came crashing to the ground. It was great fun.

After I was caught raiding my Mom's cotton stash for my tighty-whitey fighter plane, I was shut down and off limits from a respectable fuselage due to the lack of building materials. That was the end of my fighter pilot career. Bummer.

And now I am going to tell you how that memory affects me today. We have just met some new and incredible friends. These new friends were introduced to us by some other great friends who are half way around the world on their sailboat. Our friends half way around the world said “I have a brother in Bend, so while you are there, YOU HAVE TO GET IN TOUCH WITH HIM!!!” We did get in touch and are sure glad we did. These people have an incredible story and have done amazing things and have been really fun to spend a little bit of time with.

Our new friends have made our little travel adventure look like child's play. They are a few years older than us and with those few years of extra age, they have put some serious effort into seeing the world. We poured through maps with them and learned of some exciting places that are now on our list of must sees, we got a tour of their home-on-wheels, and we got a peak at their secret travel weapon (more on that in a minute). After talking with them about their adventures, I quickly realized that if we are going to see half of the stuff that these people have seen, we are going to have to step up our game a bit and we are truly going to have to devote a lifetime to this madness. It was a humbling and exciting experience to realize that at least for these people, the adventure never gets old.

When we stopped by to see their new home-on-wheels, which is a whole story in itself, we got to see their secret travel weapon...an airplane. With this little gem, they have been able to cover some serious ground and get to places a whole lot faster than our 7 mile per hour boat goes. They have taken this little plane all over North America and have crossed the Atlantic via Greenland, Iceland, and on into Europe. Amazing.

When Gary mentioned that he was going to take their plane up for a quick spin on Sunday and asked if I would like to come along, all that I could say was “WOOOOO HOOOOO!!!” And since my last piloting experience was when I was 3 years old, my first thought was “where can I get a couple of bags of cotton so I can get my uniform on?” Brenda informed me that it was not OK for a 40 year old man to stuff his panties full of cotton and get on a plane. I was sure that all pilots wore the same outfit that I did when I was 3 so I picked up 2 bags of cotton on the way to the hangar just in case Brenda was wrong. When I got there and noticed that Gary wasn't wearing his tighty-whities packed full of cotton, I was sure that there was some kind of mistake. And when we got in the plane and still no cotton stuffed uniform...crap. I guess Brenda was right...again (she is right more than I would like to admit).

I've said it before and I'll say it again, 2 of my favorite things are seeing cool stuff and learning new things. I definitely did both of those activities on our little flight above Bend. The view was incredible from up there and since I really know nothing about flying, I upped my airplane knowledge by about a thousand percent. We had some turbulence which in all honesty was a little bit scary, we had some rain which in all honesty was a little bit scary, and when it was time to land, we had a bumpy crosswind that in all honesty was a little bit scary. For this sailor, the plane ride was in all honesty a little bit scary. But it was incredible! After the landing, my master pilot Gary said “the landing is usually a bit smoother...but I guess all pilots say that after every landing!” And then he laughed...which in all honesty was a little bit scary.

The whole airplane experience was really fascinating to me. Everything from rolling the plane out of the hanger, to taxiing down the runway, watching for traffic, the safety checks, and the flight itself were really intriguing. And since this once-upon-a-time fighter pilot loves gizmos and gadgets, an airplane is heavenly. There are more buttons, instruments, knobs, levers, doo-dads, and whutch-a-ma-call-its than you can shake a stick at. If all that I did was just hang out in the plane and learn about some of the gizmos and doo-dads, I would have been a pretty happy boy. But since I actually left the ground and got to see this stuff in action, I was ecstatic!

For me, the plane ride has been the most exciting thing that I have experienced in quite a while. When I got back to our home-on-wheels, I told Brenda all about the flight and ended my overly excited bit of rambling with, “we NEED an airplane!!!” Brenda is not as excited about getting a plane as I am so until I can change her mind, I am just going to go back to my earlier days of flying. So I now have my pilot's uniform on...cotton is stuffed in my panties...I have magazines in my outstretched arms...I have climbed onto the table in our home-on-wheels and I am getting ready for takeoff...the view is great from up here (although not nearly as great as it would be in my very own real plane)...and the landing is surprisingly even more bumpy than it was with Gary. After my landing, I tell Brenda “the landing is usually a bit smoother...but I guess all pilots say that after every landing!” Flying is great fun.

The Secret Weapon

Taxiing out for take-off.  And that's Gary...aka The Red Baron

High above Bend