TOUR AMERICA, 2019: TUCSON, ARIZONA – THE GRAND CANYON STATE

Places We Have Called Home In 2020

Home Is Where We Park It:   NOMADS Project, New Hope United Methodist Church

February 2, 2020

Temperature 71 Degrees

Insane Weather

Pima Air and Space Museum, Continued

The weather here is absolutely insane.  Today we are at 71 degrees with clear blue skies and bright sunshine.  Tomorrow, oh boy here we go.  The weather report says during the day it will only be in the mid 50’s but by nightfall we’ll be down in the – ready for this – the 20’s!  Moreover, the big chill is supposed to last for the next three days.  I want to know who I can talk to about this.  If I didn’t have a commitment here I’d be out of here in a heart beat.

We’re pulling out blankets and curtains and heaters – all the stuff we haven’t used since the early days in NJ.  We trying to conserve propane since we’re going to need the furnace for a few days.  We just have to hang tight and make it to Thursday and we should be alright.

Enough of that nasty stuff.  Let’s go sightseeing again.

The Pima Air & Space Museum, located in Tucson, Arizona, is one of the world’s largest non-government funded aerospace museums. The museum features a display of nearly 300 aircraft spread out over 80 acres on a campus occupying 127 acres. It has also been the home to the Arizona Aviation Hall of Fame since 1991.  There is also another museum within the museum, namely the 390th Memorial Museum which will we visit sometime soon.

Once again rather than try and show everything that is here – which would be impossible no mater how many blogs I posted – I’ll try and present some of the more unusual things I found.

I call this the peek a boo helicopter.  See that unusual thing sticking up above the rotors?  The mast mounted sight allowed the helicopter to take a peek for targets without rising above the tree line or a hill top.  Might slick don’t you think.

I believe I’ve found a way to get my rig over those big hills.  This is the Skycrane Heavy Lift Transport that is still in service today.  It can lift up to 20,000 pounds so maybe I have to rethink lifting my rig.  Definitely a Class B.

How do you teach new recruits to be bombardiers?  This is how.  The AT-11.  A bomb bay replaced the passenger space and a transparent nose featured a bomb sight for training future bombardiers.

I believe you could call this the little plane that could.  When I stood next to it the wing was even with my nose.  This one is small and compact.

Tight quarters to say the least.  Also, very basic and simple.  Yes, it was home built.

 

A whole lot bigger.  This is the B-24.  It served on almost every battle front, it was produced in greater numbers, delivered more bombs and was flown by more allied crews than any other bomber during the war.

The biggest one of all.

The B-29.  It carried more bombs higher, farther and faster than any other bomber of WW II.

Now how about this.

Now, we’re going to move to something totally different.

Eric Firestone, who owns and operates Eric Firestone Gallery in Hampton, New York, approached longtime New York arts writer and curator Carlo McCormick with an idea: Contemporary art on retired aircraft — new canvases for the artists and new lives for rusting planes.  The result, take a look.

Since I don’t have an artist’s bone in my body I’ll offer no comment except to say they were unique to say the least.

If you have never been to the Pima Air and Space Museum it definitely deserves to go on your bucket list.  We figured it out and I spent over 10 hours here and still didn’t get to see it all.  It is awesome and I’m so glad I had the opportunity to visit it.

Then there was lunch and I finally was able to get my hands on a special kind of hot dog that I’ve wanted to try for a long, long time..

It’s the middle one, the Sonoran Dog

It is a bacon wrapped hot dog with pinto beans, tomato, grilled onions, mayonnaise, mustard and jalapeno sauce.  Believe me it is delicious!

Another day on The Road of Retirement has come to a close.  The Super Bowl is in the books and finally we had a game worth watching.  What a come back,  KC looked like they were completely out of it but they never gave up.  A lesson for all of us.   Time now for us to rig for cold weather.  We just keep telling ourselves, all we have to do is make it to Wednesday and the temperatures will start going back up a bit.  But a bit is better than nothing.

Thanks again for checking in with us.  Hopefully, no more missed blogs from this point forward.  I just couldn’t get myself in gear last night.  Till tomorrow.

These are the voyages of  Graybeard and it’s two intrepid travelers.  Our continuing mission: to explore as many new states as possible, to seek out new acquaintances and make new friends, to boldly go where we have never been before

See you on down the road!