Kentucky Rain

Saturday morning I woke up before 6am, so I just went ahead and got up and ready to go. Convincing Kaylee was a little tougher, but after 6:30 I finally got her moving too. We got out to the airport before 7, I got the T-6 pulled out and ready to go, and we headed to Marion for their fly-in breakfast together. Kaylee asked if she could fly the Six, so I gave the controls over to her until I heard the traffic flow over there and how crazy busy it was. Traffic was all over the place, but it worked out pretty well if people were patient and communicating well. Anyway, when I came in and landed, the parking guys all would wave at Kaylee, so she felt pretty special taxiing up. :)

We were supposed to be able to get a free breakfast and skip the line, but when we arrived, the line was short, so we just went ahead and didn't take advantage of the freebie. I ran into R+10 and the Yak guys and Bill and a few others and said hello to them briefly before taking Kaylee around to see the sights. We took a tram ride around the grounds just to enjoy a breeze and see the sights too. The organizer of the event then gathered three of us ladies together to do an interview. He asked Judy about Ladies Love Taildraggers, asked the other lady about her projects, then asked me how it felt to be checked out in the Mustang. Errr.... I'll let you know if I find out? :)

Kaylee and I stayed for several hours. When I headed out, Ray had asked me to do a fly-by, so I came around the pattern, timed it with traffic so as to not be in the way, then did a high low pass (so folks further back could see too). Waved a goodbye with the wings then flew west for home. Kaylee loved the pull up at the end, even though I didn't do a real aggressive one. She asked to do "whoopdees" on the way home, so I floated her in her seat over and over until we got back to Kokomo. She had fun.

Part of the problem of the day was the heat and humidity though. It was in the 90s again, high humidity, high heat, and fairly miserable. We were outside all day in it, sweating like crazy. Back at Kokomo, we had to wait quite awhile to leave, so we sat and swatted in the hangar, too. Steve was trying to get the RG fixed up before we left, skipped the fly in today to sit and wait on a part that ended up not being what we needed, even after spending $100 to ship it overnight. Nice.

Meanwhile I got the Viking pulled out, fueled up, packed up, flight plan filed, weather checked, and all ready to go, so finally it was time to get back in a hot plane and head to a hotter place:Kentucky. Kaylee sat up front with me while Steve napped, and she asked to fly the Viking, too, which she did for almost an hour! The Viking is actually harder to do some things than the T6, and after awhile she wore out and asked me to do the altitude while she did the heading, so that's how we flew the rest of the way. She did well, and that's three different planes she flew in two days. :) Kind of neat!

We finished off the day at a church chicken dinner and trying to relax on a houseboat. It always takes awhile to get used to not needing to do something, or to quit thinking about what you need to do...we arrived just in front of some pretty strong winds and weather, so it was good to get the cool off and quiet. I was very, very done being hot and sweaty again...