It Must Have Been A No Fly Zone!

There was going to be the 100th anniversary of Naval aviation celebration at the Naval Air Station in Corpus Christi last weekend featuring an airshow with the Blue Angels.  We were very excited about this, and lined up someone to walk Butch a few times while we were gone all day on Saturday.  The gates opened at 8:00am, with the air show officially starting at 10:00am.

We left the park with Pam and Dennis at 7:00am (again, we don't like to set alarms while being retired) and headed off the Corpus.  We arrived right around 9:45, and started the half hour walk to get to where we would be viewing the show.  Our first warning that things weren't going to go off well started at 10:00 when the announcer stated that the show would start in another half hour. 

This is what we came to see. 

My favorite jet!  Lots of noise, and numerous flybys.

The Blue Angels were scheduled to fly at 3:00pm, so we had quite a while to wait.  Unfortunately, the winds and clouds interfered with about 80% of the show.  The hours drug on with mostly intermissions, apologies, and the ever unpopular phrase, "due to the wind and the low cloud ceiling conditions, these planes/jets will be unable to fly." 

Fortunately Pam and Dennis had this mat in their truck so we had something to sit on while waiting. Mark just couldn't lay on the ground so he bought a folding chair for $25. It was probably worth it since he kept falling asleep whiel sitting and waiting.  The weather was really fabulous, 85, sunny some clouds, and lots of wind.

A few biplanes, an Soviet Mig, F4U Corsairs, a couple of Coast Guard planes, and one F16 or F18 (can't remember which) hit the airspace.  Most everything was grounded.  After waiting six hours, we got the announcement that the Blue Angels would not be flying. 

After the long walk back to the truck, we headed up to Fulton to have dinner at Charlotte Plummers.  As we expected, Pam and Dennis loved the stuffed flounder dinner.  We all had the same thing, and waddled out about an hour later.  Butch was very happy to see us when we got back around 7:30pm.  A very long, disappointing day - not sure I'll ever suggest we go to another airshow.

Yesterday the four of us packed up the kayaks and headed over to Saxet Lake.  The weather was perfect, with only 10-20mph winds. 

Pam and Dennis wanted Mark to try out the hard-shelled kayak for the day.  It has a much better seat than the inflatables and would be easier on his back.

Pam was the first one through the small opening into the lake. 

Last week Gordon gave us a couple bags of frozen Red Drum fish fillets so tonight we decided to have them for dinner.  Dennis grilled half of them, and pan-fried the other half. 

Dinner was wonderful - fish, a hamburger (Mark), salad, pasta salad, and Waldorf salad

After cleaning up the dishes, the four of us played Joker with Pam and Mike.  With it we served our dessert - fudge cake.  I'm embarrassed to say, the six of us ate the whole thing! 

Even though we're all stuffed, we've already mapped out tomorrow's meals since they will be our last ones together for a while - Pam and Dennis are moving on sometime Friday morning.