It’s my first visit to the DC area and my lovely wife indulged me by going to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum annex at the Dulles Airport before anything else. I’m still looking foward to seeing the NASM at the mall later this week but I was in geek heaven seeing up close so many planes I had only before seen in scratchy photos and film footage. My wife has long ago reached the point where all airplanes look alike but she indulges me as I stand in awe looking at Roscoe Turner’s racer. I finally got her interest by showing her photos of Turner’s lion cub Gilmore. Just as special were the planes of some pilots I have seen fly such as Bob Hoover and Art Scholl. In fact I saw both of them fly in the same airshow not long before Art’s death while making Top Gun.
Ah, this brings back memories. I grew up in suburban Washington, DC. One of my favorite memories is going to the old NASM, which was housed in a Quonset hut on the Smithsonian grounds. A bunch of old rockets stood outside, while inside held a model of the X-1 and the Vin Fizz (the first airplane to make it across the US). The original Wright Flyer was in the rotunda of the old original Smithsonian building, along with an old Keystone biplane bomber. Eventually they moved some of the exhibits to the National Museum of Science and Technology (NMST), and then of course to the massive new NASM. I remember when the NMST opened! I also remember when Dulles itself opened; my Boy Scout troop got to ride in the big people movers before service started at the airport.
Well, you can take the boy away from the museums, but ya can’t take the museums away from the boy; I now live within earshot of Moffett Federal Airfield (formerly Moffett NAS), which often features air shows and has the last remaining dirigible hanger in the US.
Be sure to see the Arado AR 234 Blitz, the only WW2 German jet bomber. It’s the only one left in the world.
I visited the Udvar-Hazy annex last month when I was in town with some buddies. It’s a pretty awesome display; the SR-71 and space shuttle were cool, but my favorite was seeing the Grob 102 single-seat glider that went up to 49,000’. The engines display was interesting too.
I’ve been to Washington D.C. once. Two of us went to the Crystal Palace to deliver a package. It was a quick turn-around thing, where we dropped off the package and then caught a flight back to L.A., so all we were able to do was walk around the Mall a little. Saw the Lincoln Memorial and the Vietnam Memorial. I really wanted to go to the NASM, but there was no time. Since I haven’t been flying in a few years now, if I were to go today I’d probably disolve into jelly. Seeing those beautiful aircraft would probably cause me to feel like Tantalus.
[Vaguely-related hijack]
I was hitting a rest stop in Glacier as I was driving through the park on my way back home from Missoula (not my usual route, but I had gone to see some friends up by Flathead Lake and it was faster to keep going on that path than to double-back) and I saw someone with a sweatshirt that had ‘NASM’ embroidered on it.
For a good while, I was stumped as to why anyone would be wearing a shirt honoring the Netwide Assembler.
I did figure it out in the end, and I have been there.
[/Vaguely-related hijack]
I have been kicking myself for not stopping at Wright Pat. It is on my list to do.
Wright-Patterson is well worth it. It’s hard to see it all in one day if you go go the on base hangar to see the experimental and presidential planes. That was one of my favorite parts, in particular for the “what were we thinking?” planes like the XF-85.