Anniversary

Lebette and I celebrated our anniversary by visiting the birthplace of our nation...Philadelphia Penn. We decided to make an adventure of it and took an Amtrak train up there from our local train station. How cool was that....no lines, not having to remove my shoes & belt for security, $20 bucks to upgrade to business class, no seatbelts, plenty of room to roam, and wine and food from the minute we left until we pulled into Philly...very fun. We are already planning our Boston run.

We spent three days wandering around the town enjoying the sites, eating wonderful food (yes, even a cheese steak or two), and celebrating my bride not knocking me off after all these years. We both feel great that we are better Americans for visiting Independence Hall, seeing the Liberty Bell and seeing the very chair George Washington sat in over 300 years ago!
The weather cooperated nicely and was wonderful the whole time we were in Philly.

Here are a few pictures of the Hall, Ole Glory flying outside, and the Liberty Bell.

RIAT & Farnborough Airshow

After my trips to Berlin and London this spring, I quickly returned 4 weeks later to attend the Royal International Air Tattoo (www.airtattoo.com) and Farnborough Airshow (www.farnborough.com) in the UK. In my international affairs job, I had the opportunity to attend senior USAF leadership meetings with the leaders of 17 other Air Forces around the world. Oh, and by the way, I got to watch a lot of flying demos, drink champagne, and sweat in the 104 degree heat in my suit. (One of their hottest summers on record I'm told). The pictures are of the RAF Red Arrow show at RIAT, the cockpit of the Airbus 380, and a booth (chalet) at the Farnborough air show where corporations rent out spaces to hold meetings and working lunches.

I went straight from the Berlin Air Show to London England for a conference for 4 days. I won't complain since the weather held out wonderfully in London!

Here is Hyde park in the spring, along with a good ole' pub to down a few pints!

Well,


It has been an interesting spring. First I went to Warsaw (see the last blog) and was home for a few weeks before going to the Berlin Airshow in May!! Here is a picture of one of the cathedrals in downtown Berlin....




and the Airbus going through its demo flight. The weather was rainy and overcast most of the days we were there, but the show put on by the big aircraft was impressive. I wouldn't want to be on the Airbus during this demo flight.