Hi. As some of you know, our granddaughter Felicia and her mom were in a serious car accident on Wednesday, July 28th, in San Andreas involving a DUI driver in the other vehicle; sadly with two fatalities in his car. Felicia's original diagnosis had some serious aspects to it and she was airlifted from the accident site to a hospital in Modesto; and then airlifted from there to ICU at Children's Hospital in Oakland. We quickly drove to Oakland from Southern Calif. Felicia is good! After four days at Children's she was released. She is sore and has a bum (deeply bruised) left knee, but she is becoming very agile with the crutches. Everything else turned out to be OK. Felicia's mom is also OK (broken thumb). Miraculous.
It was decided that Sandi and I should bring Felicia back to our motor home and let her rest-up with us. We will be doing our Disneyland family get-together starting Thursday and Felicia will have a great time...as will all seven of us. She will not be able to go on all of the rides, but we will have a blast I'm sure. We are truly fortunate and blessed.
Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.
Don & Sandi
Don & Sandi at "home", back in the Stockton area.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Monday, July 26, 2010
Fighter Pilot Donaldo!
Hi. As many of you know, one of the most exciting (and perfect) retirement gifts I received from wonderful NHUSD friends and colleagues (and you know who you are!), was a flight in a military trainer with simulated aerial dogfights at approximately 5,000 feet in the sky through Air Combat USA. Well, today was the day I had the experience of a lifetime flying out of Fullerton airport in Southern California. On a previous blog entry about a week ago, I had stated that our ride on the waver runners on San Luis bay was a 9.5 out of 10. I must amend that comment ;-). I have to move that experience to being a 6 out of 10...and today's aerial dogfight experience to being an 11 out of 10. Wow!
I had a 1-hour briefing with the instructor pilot; then donned the flight suit, life-vest, and the parachute. Yup. FAA requirements for this type of flight require the wearing of a parachute. The instruction I received today regarding the chute, if we had to use it, was, "Get out of your seat harness, stand on your seat, and dive head-first past the trailing edge of the wing. If you survive that, pull the d-ring to open your chute." Hmmm.
Then came the actual flight (with the instructor of course). We went up through the clouds as it was overcast and then did some training maneuvers and then engaged in five simulated aerial dogfights. I am struggling to find the words to describe today's experience. I have a private pilot's license and so I have been in "small airplanes" many times over the years. This was beyond anything I could have imagined.
Let me briefly describe one dogfight. (Note: The dogfights are certainly mostly scripted, but do have their own twists-and-turns.) The dogfight began by us heading towards each other at a closing rate of approximately 400 miles per hour (200 mph in each aircraft). Once we passed each other at about 300 feet apart, we went after the "bogey" by climbing straight-up; then turned sharply left over the wing, dove down to come-up from behind the other plane by swooping down and back-up again to get his plane into my windshield target area. Then I pulled the trigger and "electronically" caused smoke to come out of the back of his plane. That was one fight...we had four more. We pulled positive-G's and negative G's. We were right-side up, upside-down, sideways, straight-up, and straight-down. This was the wildest roller-coaster-in-the-air-at-a-mile-high ride I have EVER had. I will never forget this once in a lifetime experience. Thank you!
Donaldo
I had a 1-hour briefing with the instructor pilot; then donned the flight suit, life-vest, and the parachute. Yup. FAA requirements for this type of flight require the wearing of a parachute. The instruction I received today regarding the chute, if we had to use it, was, "Get out of your seat harness, stand on your seat, and dive head-first past the trailing edge of the wing. If you survive that, pull the d-ring to open your chute." Hmmm.
Then came the actual flight (with the instructor of course). We went up through the clouds as it was overcast and then did some training maneuvers and then engaged in five simulated aerial dogfights. I am struggling to find the words to describe today's experience. I have a private pilot's license and so I have been in "small airplanes" many times over the years. This was beyond anything I could have imagined.
Let me briefly describe one dogfight. (Note: The dogfights are certainly mostly scripted, but do have their own twists-and-turns.) The dogfight began by us heading towards each other at a closing rate of approximately 400 miles per hour (200 mph in each aircraft). Once we passed each other at about 300 feet apart, we went after the "bogey" by climbing straight-up; then turned sharply left over the wing, dove down to come-up from behind the other plane by swooping down and back-up again to get his plane into my windshield target area. Then I pulled the trigger and "electronically" caused smoke to come out of the back of his plane. That was one fight...we had four more. We pulled positive-G's and negative G's. We were right-side up, upside-down, sideways, straight-up, and straight-down. This was the wildest roller-coaster-in-the-air-at-a-mile-high ride I have EVER had. I will never forget this once in a lifetime experience. Thank you!
Donaldo
Monday, July 19, 2010
Don & Sandi --> Wave Runners!
Hi Everyone,
On our third day in San Luis Obispo, we decided to become "wave runners"! We went on a 2.5 hour wave runner (jet ski) tour of the San Luis bay harbor. It was very exciting...and frankly a little scary at times. We have been on wave runners on lakes, but never in the bay or ocean. When we rounded the protected rock strand that kept the waters a bit calmer, we found ourselves going through, and over, some fairly challenging swells. But it was a great adventure...a 9.5 on a scale of 1 to 10. We even saw a few sea lions; and two otters laying on their backs just enjoying life....not dissimilar to us.
A couple of photos are attached.
Hope all is well.
Don & Sandi
On our third day in San Luis Obispo, we decided to become "wave runners"! We went on a 2.5 hour wave runner (jet ski) tour of the San Luis bay harbor. It was very exciting...and frankly a little scary at times. We have been on wave runners on lakes, but never in the bay or ocean. When we rounded the protected rock strand that kept the waters a bit calmer, we found ourselves going through, and over, some fairly challenging swells. But it was a great adventure...a 9.5 on a scale of 1 to 10. We even saw a few sea lions; and two otters laying on their backs just enjoying life....not dissimilar to us.
A couple of photos are attached.
Hope all is well.
Don & Sandi
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