Pensacola, Florida - Jan 14-16

Weather is clearing and today was actually sunny.  It is still cool by my standards – in the 50s, but hey, it beats 20s and 30s! Our campground is actually in Pensacola Beach on an island.  We were camping in the middle of a beach resort town. Across the street were several seafood restaurants and sports bars and on either side of the campground were small shopping malls. The back side of the campground bordered an inlet and we had beautiful views of the water.

Our two days in Pensacola were spent at the National Naval Aviation Museum. Russ had a great time for those two days.  I have to say I enjoyed myself also. There was a ton of restored aircraft in the museum, several placed into exhibits which set context for the time period when the plane was in use and others that were hung from the ceiling. You had to kind of watch where you were walking because you could bump your head on a tail section or wing. We were surprised that the planes were, for the most part, not roped off.  A docent told us that they want people to have close access to the planes and it was ok to touch them. The planes were beautifully restored and the descriptions were interesting.  They didn’t overdo the technical descriptions and make the whole thing boring.  There were two floors in one of the buildings and on the second floor, they had displays and exhibits honoring women in naval aviation, the space program (I didn’t know that the majority of astronauts had been naval aviators), lighter than air flight programs and the home front.  Even the café was historical; it was a replica of a well-known officer’s club in Cubic Bay, Philippines. The walls were covered with plaques that various squadrons left when their tour was over. When the club closed after the volcano exploded in the 90s, they shipped everything over to the museum, including the carved wooden doors, the bar, and somewhere around 4,000 plaques.

I particularly enjoyed the flight deck operations simulation. It turned out that the docent (almost all docents are retired Navy), had been on the same aircraft carrier as Russ on the tour of duty immediately following Russ’. So they had a good time reminiscing about that time period. And the simulation was pretty cool because you got a sense of what it was like to be part of the flight deck crew as planes were taking off and landing.  There was noise and lots of wind, but Russ said it was pretty tame compared to what it was really like.

The second day we came back to take the tour out on the flight line where there are 90 more aircraft waiting to be restored. This docent was extremely knowledgeable about every aircraft and there were several people on the bus who had serviced or flown some of them. Russ saw a plane that was a trainer like the one he had trained on.  And while we were out there, four trainer jets took off that were the Blue Angels trainer planes (Pensacola is the home base for the Blue Angels.) We were in the area at the wrong time to watch them train, but starting in March, they train a couple times a week and you can go out and watch them. 

On our way out of town, we stopped at a tire service to get one of our tires replaced.  We had had a tire shipped out from Tiremark.com to one of their approved installers in Pensacola. We wanted to put the same make of tire on to replace the one we had to get back in Texas when the original tire went flat. Also, Russ wanted them to check out another tire which has had a slow leak since we left California.  Well, imagine my surprise to find out the leak was because of a nail in the tire! I thought it would be something simple like a bad valve. They were able to fix it and send us on our way.

Now we are headed to Jacksonville to see the sights in that area, including the Atlantic Ocean!

An atrium in the first building had this display of a previous generation of Blue Angel planes.

This is an example of the vignettes that were spread around the museum. This one depicts a beach camp during WW I with a very early amphibious plane.

You can get a sense of just how crowded the museum was.  Planes, engines, ancillary equipment and models were crammed together in an artistic fashion.

A Japanese zero plane in the background along with a display of the kamikaze pilot's flight gear.

My dad was an aircraft mechanic in the Chinese theater during WW II.  He worked on this type of plane, a P-40.  This was the plane that the Flying Tigers flew during their participation in the war.  We have several Flying Tiger items from Dad's momentos.

Another vignette which helped to set context for the plane displays.

The Homefront Exhibit depicted a main street and home during WW II.  I recognized several of the appliances (Yikes, everything looked old, but how can that be?  I am so young!!!)

This is the actual cold weather clothing that Admiral Byrd used in his adventures to the South and North Poles.

A Sopwith Camel, made famous by Snoopy as the WW I flying ace. Right behind it was the plane flown by the Red Baron.

Russ, his parents and Chris once took a ride in one of these Ford Tri-Motors (built in 1920s or so) out of Long Beach.

 

This is the helicopter that was used as Marine One when Nixon was in office. That's him behind the window.

This plane was built by Grumman (which merged with Northrop in the 1990s.) It seemed like Grumman built about half the planes in the museum. I knew that Grumman had a huge history with the Navy, I just never appreciated just how big a partner they were.

This is a WW II Nazi plane, the first operational jet in the war.

 

The same type of plane that George H. W. Bush flew in WW II. This is another Grumman design.

This is a Grumman A-6, which is the kind of plane that Russ was a bombardier-navigator for during the Vietnam war.  His squadron was stationed on a carrier that was in the Mediterranean.

This is the radar console that Russ had his head stuck in while he was chauffeured around by the pilot. Every day he was on the carrier, he got to fly off and on the ship.  Had a great time - like  Boy Scout camp for grown-ups.

The walk  between the two buildings passed by a Grumman E-2C AWACs plane.

Another vignette - this one of a camp in the Pacific theater on one of the tropical islands.

Russ thoroughly enjoyed his visit to the National Naval Aviation Museum.