We had a "slow" Start this morning - everyone took their time to get going. After it being rather late, we decided not go to Silversprings and not go to one of the theme parks.
However, browsing through some local magazines, we found an advertisement (and a 3 US$ Coupon) for "Fantasy of flight". This is a museum about old and new airplanes - Just the wright - sorry right- thing to do for the already advanced day.
After a short ride (3-lane US Highway, Country Music in the radio - what a life), we arrived at the exhibit. The entrance was clearly marked with a "Super Constellation" ("Super Conny") - one of the prettiest airplanes in my opinion.
First they had a presentation about early flight and some "glorification" about WW I and WW II (not really my kind of thing). Thereafter, airplanes were shown in two hangars in "better-than-new" shape. No corrosion, perfect paint - just magnificent airplanes. Most of the planes are in airworthy condition.
The boys really liked the cockpit mock-ups of jets and other airplanes.
But - look for yourself. Here are some pictures.
At 1:30 - a "Fieseler Storch" was taken out of the hangar. This was an old liaison airplane used in WWII by Germany (Yeah, yeah, I know what I said about war glorification before…) and they fired up the engine and did a presentation of the capabilities. The airplane has a 238 BHp engine and it can take of in 100ft. or less.
The pilot did some "high-speed" passes at about 90 knots and some "slow-speed" passes at about 40 knots. With the 10knot headwind, this was more like 30 knots.
The boys found the kids corner on the inside of the hangar and spent some time building paper airplanes, fly a hangglider simulator (Felix loved it - he flew at least 30 times - I had to try it too…), a balloon simulator and lot of experiments.
On the outside, biplane rides were offered. There were two type of rides available. First, one could fly in a Boeing Stearman - one Pax or a Standard D-25 with 4 seats. As we are 4 people, the Standard would be the airplane of choice. Have a look at the website of the owners http://www.waldowrights.com/
However, at first, Felix wasn’t too convinced he wanted to go and then Max got second thoughts. We went to have a look at the Standard D-25 and immediately the pilot and his girlfriend (wife??) Gill(?) got to talk with the boys, showing them headsets, showing them old pictures, telling them interesting things about the aircraft, agreeing on handsignals, if something is wrong and.. and… and… They were doing a really good job with the boys and Felix eventually decided to come along on the flight. Max however, had made up his mind, that he didn’t want to go.
Helga went with Max on a tram ride around the airfield and looked at all the old aircraft in all the other hangars, heard interesting things about aircraft restoration.
Felix and I waited for our turn in the D-25. We got pilot jackets, leather helmets and a scarf. Eventually the airplane returned with the previous customers. We took some photos and buckled up in the airplane.
Starting a radial engine is always a nice and noisy experience - no different in the D-25. a loud "Clear" - engaging the starter - three or four blades passed - ignition on and the engine came to live. We taxied to the grass strip and then full-power and off we went.
After leaving the pattern we did some shallow turns, some steep turns, some lazy-8’s and some low flight over the lakes. We looked out for alligators and I think we saw some.
Then we went back to the airfield, made a pass to check the wind and landed.
Taxiing back from the runway, we saw Max and Helga coming back from the tram ride.
We unbuckled, got out of the airplane, returned the jackets and said "Bye-bye" to the airplane, the pilot and Gill.
We had to stop for another ride in the hangglider simulator and thereafter we got to the parking lot and drove back to Orlando.
