California Trip Videos

Flying over the Grand Canyon

Burbank Bob Hope Airport (N21YF is on the ground in California!)

Flying home over Arizona

New Orleans Arrival

Home Sweet Home

10/7 Today is the last day of our cross country trip, a nonstop flight from New Orleans back home to Merritt Island. The terrain is starting to look familiar again - blue and green swamplands instead of brown mountains, sandy deserts and green valleys. Even with the picutres to prove it, it's hard to believe we really flew One Yankee Fox coast to coast!

Leaving New Orleans

10/7 Before leaving New Orleans, we stopped at the famous Cafe Du Monde for Beignets. Then we were off to the airport and on our way back home.

Heading Home - Day 3

10/6 Today we flew from El Paso to New Orleans with a fuel stop in San Antonio. Tonight we're staying at the Marriott in downtown New Orleans with a gorgeous view of the Mississippi River. It's good to see the city coming back to life after Katrina, although some areas have a long way to go before they are restored. Seeing the extent of the damage first hand is sobering.

Heading Home - Day 2

10/5 Another beautiful flight today. Keeping an eye on the weather ahead of us, we are playing it safe and staying in El Paso tonight.

Landing in Mesa, AZ

Heading Home - Day 1

10/4 The NSGCD Conference is over, Marcie successfully passed her peer review and is now a CPO-CD, and we're headed back home. First stop, Mesa, AZ. Here are some highlights of this leg of the flight.

Downtown Los Angeles

9/30 After dropping off some things at the plane, we switched hotels to the Omni in downtown LA. Our room on the 12th floor overlooks a courtyard with dancing fountains. Marcie is studying for her NSGCD Level III Peer Review on Thursday morning. The NSGCD Conference on starts on Friday.

Whirlwind Tour of LA

9/28 & 9/29 My dear husband gave me an excellent tour of LA. First we drove through Beverly Hills, which he knows like the back of his hand from watching TV show such as the Beverly Hillbillies and Beverly Hills Cop. We also visited the Ronald Regan Library, Sants Barbara, La Brea Tar Pits,and Hollywood Blvd.

We're Here!

9/28 Another beautiful flight from Henderson, NV to Burbank, CA. Along the way we overflew Edwards Airforce Base (secondary landing strip for the Space Shuttle) and Palmdale (where the Shuttle was manufactured.) Burbank airport is just over a 7000 ft mountain ridge; in the distance you can see the 14,000 foot mountains along the Pacific Coast.

Flight Plan

Here is the route we flew from Merritt Island, FL to Los Angeles, CA.

All you need is love

9/27 In the evening we headed over to the Vegas Strip. Dinner at the Flamingo buffet, then off to see the Beatles Love (Cirque de Soleil) show at the Mirage. Our seats were among the best in the house and the show was spectacular! It was like a second honeymoon 

Cacti Galore

9/27 This morning we toured the Botanical Cactus garden at the Ethel M Chocolate Factory. An impressive collection of cacti, plus we spotted a real road runner! After several attempts I managed to snap his picture.

Red Velvet Café

9/26 Las Vegas, NV. Dinner tonight at the Red Velvet Café, a restaurant that serves “Vegetarian, Vegan and Non-vegetarian lifestyle” cuisine. The vegan “chicken” mushroom and spinach melt Marcie ordered was just heavenly, as was Mike’s sandwich and the signature vegan Red Velvet Cake we shared for desert. This restaurant definitely lived up to its reputation and was well worth the drive.

Over the Grand Canyon

9/26 Today we flew from Junction, TX to Henderson, Nevada with a fuel stop in Deming, NM. The skies were clear today and we were surprised by the vastness of West Texas and the sometimes spotty radio coverage. As we continued west, hills then mountains appeared. We also spotted several wind farms, crop circles and salt flats.

The biggest surprise was an in flight change of route by ATC that put us right over the Grand Canyon! The approach to Henderson was also quite interesting – essentially you fly over a mountain ridge then dive steeply into the runway approach.

And we’re off!

9/25 A full day of flying today, from Merritt Island to Junction, TX with fuel stops in Tallahassee, FL and Baton Rouge, LA. The skies were cloudy due to remnants of the front that kept us grounded yesterday, but the weather was otherwise good.

After nearly 7 hours of flying, we got to our hotel in Junction and plopped into bed!

California Cross Country

After a one day departure delay due to weather along the route, we are finally really to begin our cross country trip to California!

We are headed to Los Angeles for the National Study Group on Chronic Disorganization (NSGCD) Conference with a planned stop in Las Vegas to see Cirque de Soleil's "Love" at the Mirage.

Our flight path will take us along the southern coast of the U.S., roughly following Interstate 10. You can follow our flight at www.flightaware.com , just type in the tail number N21YF in the flight tracker box on the left hand side of the page.