This is not at all Xterra-related, but I figured many here might like to see these - and I did drive there in the Xterra.
On Saturday 12 February the US Navy celebrated 100 years of naval aviation with an almost 200-plane Parade of Flight over San Diego Bay. The aircraft ranged in age from pre-WWII to the most modern. The fly-over was spread over 2 hours, and finished with the full air wing of the carrier Stennis flying in from the west. A group of us from a local San Diego photo club met on Shelter Island to watch. We got there at about 9:40AM, and almost all of the parking and standing space along the water was gone. We did manage to secure a pretty good viewing spot though. The fly-over started at 1:00PM. They started things off with a pair of LCAC's (hover-crafts) skimming over the Bay.
Next up were the Blue Angels. Unlike the other planes, which took off from either NAS North Island (Coronado), Brown Field or Miramar, the Blue Angles merely took a few minutes out of the practices in Yuma, and did a quick fly-by of San Diego Bay. They came in screaming over the Coronado Bridge, north along the Bay, then turned south over NASNI and went screaming back to Yuma.
There they go, headed back to Arizona.
The Navy's Leap Frogs dropped in (more than once actually).
It just seems appropriate to show the B-17 in black & white.
There was a demonstration of helicopter aerial refueling.
There were thousands of people lining the shores of San Diego Bay, lots of spectator boats in the water, and a whole lot of aircraft in the air. One of the reasons our group specifically picked Shelter Island rather than going on board the base was so that we could have the City in the background.
At the same time that all of this was going on the Moon was rising in the east.
At the end of the day there was a lot of traffic leaving Shelter Island, so we walked to an early dinner, then got back to our cars just in time to catch the sunset.
GO NAVY!
There are a lot more pictures in
this gallery and in
this gallery.
