The Mecca Chronicles: Day Three

It's 9 pm my time, but it feels like about 6:30. I do like summer for this reason. It was a beautiful day. More cool temps, more blue skies, more light breezes. It's been perfect so far. It's supposed to heat up in a couple of days, high humidity and all, so I'm really enjoying these days while I've got them.

We sat in our lawn chairs with cool beverages and listened in on the Oshkosh radio traffic with our hand-held radio. The traffic was steady today, and you could see an airplane about anytime you looked up. But it still wasn't "Oshkosh Busy" yet. They were still using N numbers and talking a little too much. When it's crunch time the rest of the week, you won't hear anything but non-stop "red and white highwing, do this." In the meantime we heard a few goobers who should be thankful they came in today instead of tomorrow, a few go-arounds, and a few "Nice Job"s. There's the "exit runway no delay", and the always famous "Welcome to Oshkosh!"

Today the warbirds came in, and while unfortunately we couldn't see them because of the runway they were using today, we could hear them, and of course hear them on the radio. B-25, T-6, TBM, P-51, etc. Nathan arrived today as well, and we walked down to Warbirds to help him carry his stuff back. While we were walking across the area, we saw several new planes being set up. A Cirrus jet for one; a crosswind simulator, etc. The fields were filling up with planes and tents, and the roads are backed up with trailers, motorcycles, pickups and buses, all waiting to get into the camping area. Everywhere you look there are signs "I'd Rather Be Flying", and "Oshkosh or Bust". The invasion is almost here full force...

We spent today walking around the flight line, checking out the new stuff, watching airplanes, listening to the radio chatter, and eating too much food. I sure am glad not to be sitting at home buzzing around in a 172, but rather sitting here watching airplanes from all over the world flying overhead. ;)

Time to get by the fire before retiring for the evening!