Texas Gypsies: EAA Airventure Day 3

Wednesday, July 30

We had such good parking yesterday we decided to arrive about the same time to get that good parking again. We succeeded in getting our good parking again. Today is going to be a long day. There is going to be a night air show which we plan to stay for. This morning we decided to head straight for the ultra-light and light sport planes. They were on the schedule to fly early every morning or 6:30pm in the evenings.

On our way to the ultra-lights there was this hot air balloon demo. Weather permitting there is to be a balloon launch at 6am on Saturday. We are thinking about attending it.

Here is an ultra-light with floats. Someone actually flew this in and is camping in a tent next to his aircraft.

The aircraft above and the 2 below are called light sport aircraft for sale here.

The price for the blue one above was $91K.

Here is an ultra-light just taking off. Below is another ultra-light taking off.

This plane and the 2 pictures below are of light sport planes.

It was fun watching these ultra-lights and light sport planes take-off, fly around and land. This is something Tic has been interested in. Next the gyro-copters & helicopters flew.

This is a kit-built helicopter this man is getting ready to fly.

These are some home-built gyro-copters getting ready to fly. All gyro-copters in the U.S. are amateur built. There are no certified gyro-copters for sale in the U.S. Unlike Europe where you can purchase a certified gyro.

Here is one of the gyro-copters flying. Tic stood and took pictures while I sat in the grass. I began sneezing but did not think much about it. We watched for about 2 hours.

As we walked towards the tram stop, we saw a group of planes that were in an area labeled "Past Winners". They were all restored vintage planes.

This is one of the early aerobatic planes The Great Waldo Pepper used.

This is a puddle jumper used by Pan American Airways.

This one was used to carry mail by American Airways.

Look how shinny this Cessna 140 is! Lots of work.

Another older bi-plane that was in the vintage area.

The Gee Bee Model R Super Sportster was a special purpose racing aircraft made by Granville Brothers Aircraft of Springfield, Massachusetts in 1932. Gee Bee stands for Granville Brothers. We did get to see it fly later in the day at the afternoon air show.

Here we are watching our 3rd air show. It has been so much fun watching air shows every day. We did go back to the car and get our chairs for this show.

These pilots are amazing. I've been awed daily.

The smoke looks twisted because of all the rolls this pilot did with his plane.

Look how many twists and flips this pilot did on his way down. Plane after plane in this afternoon show entertained us. The air shows were about 3 hours long each day.

Today we got to see Vietnam era helicopters. Here is a cobra. Below is a Huey.

They Huey was considered the soldiers life line in Vietnam.

A short ways away we could see powered parachutes flying also.

Here are some more planes flying in formation. They held that formation through most of their maneuvers. See the smoke trails.

As we watched the afternoon show I kept sneezing and getting more and more plugged up. We did stay and watch the night air show until about 9:20pm. By then I felt miserable so we left.
The pictures I took did not turn out as you can tell below.