US Trip

Wonderful advice! Reminds me of the time we drove up to DC specifically to view and photograph a certain Gauguin at the National Gallery only to find that particular section of the museum closed for renovations! What a bummer that was!

Before proceeding to the Marine Museum in Quantico, you’d better check to see if it is open yet. I believe the original museum shut down in the fall of 2002 and the new museum wasn’t scheduled to open until later this year.

The original museum was small but well worth the visit. I look forward to the new museum.

An excellent idea, AVI, may look into both of thjose options, thanks for the suggestions…looking forward to the trip even more now!

M

CORSAIR GATHERING

Mark – give Tony Pileggi a call and check out his 82% Corsair. Tony is located near Frederick, MD, not too far from the DC area. There’s also a nice F4U at the USMC museum in Quantico. Tony: http://www.corsair82.com

Will be seeing the udvar hazy facility on my swing back east to the Corsair Gathering in Connecticut…t minus 1 week and counting…i leave on the 2nd and return the 12th…looking forward to it immensely….

M

Just back from USAFM and the 3 NA&SM facilities and can confirm that all are full of amazing aircraft, Hazy is certainly one not to miss.

Ah, but NASM Downtown, as remarkable as it is, pales in comparison with Hazy. Hazy is the Disneyworld of aviation and it would be a shame to be so close and not to set foot there! You’d be absolutely amazed and overjoyed from the moment you walk up the entrance ramp to face the P-40 and F4U suspended at eye level. And now there’s a Lysander hanging up as well.

You’re right, it certianly looks amazing, but even if I had a straight choice between Dulles and Downtown, I would still go for Downtown, ….they’ve got the Spirit of St Louis! Ever since I read ‘Lindbergh’ by A Scott Berg, I’ve wanted to see the aircraft in the flesh. Hopefully another ambition will be achieved 🙂

Ah, but NASM Downtown, as remarkable as it is, pales in comparison with Hazy. Hazy is the Disneyworld of aviation and it would be a shame to be so close and not to set foot there! You’d be absolutely amazed and overjoyed from the moment you walk up the entrance ramp to face the P-40 and F4U suspended at eye level. And now there’s a Lysander hanging up as well.

Oh, and yes, as a north of the border native, I can vouch for the fact that we did heartily reject the offer of annexation back in 1812. Can you picture Mounties in dress blues instead of scarlets? Com’n!

No I can’t, it was a typo my friend 😉

Thanks for the advice, I full well appreciate the size of both the United States and Canada. I have studied the transit times, and locations of bus stops and yes, its an immense county but heres the great thing, having no set plan means that if you run out of time, you just dont do something and find something else to do (even rent a car!). Your advice is taken onboard though with thanks. As for the bus stations being located in seedy areas….hmmm..not too good but hey, id rather see as many aspects of American culture as I can (eternal optimist?)

Im not going to the USA for Airshows or Aircraft museums, hence my orginal post stating “””places close to City centres are preffered as the only time we shall rent a car is in Phoenix”””. I d love to see the odd aircraft here and there but I also want to see many other things such as Art, maybe some Jazz in new Orleans or a Ball game at Fenway Park 🙂 etc etc, So i’m prepared to go a little out of my way but not a lot. Thats why the NASM (not dulles) and CAF, Mesa will be ideal.

Best get back to packing the bag!

thanks again, steve

US/Canada By Greyhound

Steve:

I don’t think you’ve quite grasped how vast our two countries are and how great the distances from city to city are, compared to distances in Europe. For example, the training area in Cold Lake, if superimposed over a map of Western Europe would most likely blanket most of the continent. And that’s just one military training area.

If you’re planning to travel by Greyhound, you’re taking the proverbial slow boat to China, and you’re likely to spend many hours of downtime sitting in a Greyhound terminal between busses. Incidentally, Greyhound terminals seem to be located in some of the worst (read: seedy) parts of town, and you’re also going to be exposed to the seedy part of our culture. Now, in a town like Toronto, you’re not going to have much to worry about, but it may not be the same around DC.

I hate to sound like a party pooper, but there’s not much sightseeing to be done by Greyhound, running along the freeway and interstates. When you do find the time to stop over in a major area, you’re very likely going to have to rent a car to get anywhere. Mass transit and Amtrak are not what you might expect.

Yes, there is a shuttle from NASM Downtown out to Dulles and Hazy, ( I think it’s $7.50 per person one way) but unless you choose to travel by taxi cab, you’re going to have a lot of real life humping in front of you.

If you’re in the DC area, it would be a shame to miss the wonderful, if small, Marine museum located in Quantico. Yes, Quantico is just down the road from DC, but you’re going to need an automobile to get there. See what I mean?

And take the Orlando area … Fantasy of Flight is a fair distance from the Flying Tiger Museum, and I don’t believe that there’s any type of bus service between the two locations. You’d have to rent a car.

Here in North Carolina and Virginia, we’re in the airshow season, but without a car, you’d never be able to visit Langley, Oceana, Cherry Point, Fort Bragg, Camp Lejeune or Seymour johnson. By the time you made it to these military bases/stations, the show would be over!

My advice is to decide on a plan. Are you going to drive across the continent and wave at folks from the window of a Greyhound, or do you want to hit a couple of the great aviation museums? You could spend a few days just checking out NASM Downtown and Hazy out in Dulles while in DC, but it would be a shame not to allow a couple more days for some sightseeing and to visit the various museums and tourist attractions in the Washington area.

Somebody up above in a previous post said, “you might be biting off more than you can chew.” Oh, and yes, as a north of the border native, I can vouch for the fact that we did heartily reject the offer of annexation back in 1812. Can you picture Mounties in dress blues instead of scarlets? Com’n!

Kingman

If you pass through Kingman you may as well stop for half an hour at the Local Museum of Culture ( or somethin like that name ) – it has a small display dedicated to the great silver fleet that was smelted down at Kingman – couple of nose art panels and a cabinet with a few artefacts – not a lot but if you like 17’s worthwile .

One word of warning – outside that Museum are two Cactus Bushes – one of which yours truly walked into !! – I had a whole bunch of needles stuck in my arm – very painful indeed !! 😮

Hello,

well I head off to London tomorrow and then on to New York on the 24th. Thanks for all the info everyone and enjoy the next month of the airshow season.

best regards, steve

ps- everyone behave themselves 😉

Newbie here… Hope your going for a wedding with that timing….cause the Detroit air shows are May 21-22 for Selfridge Airbase, Yankee Airforce (Thunder over Michigan) Aug5-7,Oschkosh July25-31 3hrs(ish)north of Chicago. That being said 🙁 .. Chicago.. Science/industry museum, Natural History museum, Art Museum, and the Aquarium are great places to visit. Science and Industry take a cab to it, then check bus times to the other museums they are basically next to each other (or cab it)

On your way to Detroit if you can the stop at the www.Airzoo.org is nice.. abit pricey.

In Detroit..Henry Ford Museum/IMAX/Greenfield Village If your here thats where to go. Art museum is.. OK we go to Chicago or Toronto to have fun (down town type fun) Detroit is a nice city(looking at it from Windsor Ont. or appox 4,000 ft up and 20miles out or sitting on a boat.Hard to get carjacked from those last three locations :rolleyes: )

Yankee Airforce (your going to miss a loud show, can’t you get lost in LasVegas or Colorado till August??) 7-B17’s, 1-B24, 1-LB30(B24), 1-B29, 5-B25’s, JU52 4-P51’s, 4-P47’s etc…

Dayton Ohio is about 200 miles south of Detroit so thats probably out of range but but that would be the place to visit for static displays

On you way to Toronto is the Canadian Warplane Heritage. www.warplane.com/
and could tie that into a nice side trip to Niagara Falls/Niagara on the Lake great wine country.. plus
www.fightercombat.com go in a Strearman or Extra 300 and down the steet you could do Helicopter rides over the falls

Cheers, Hope you have a go and safe trip
Tony

Hi Hatton–

Noticed your ref to art galleries; it may be of interest that both the Canada Aviation Museum (Ottawa) and the Toronto Aerospace Museum (up Keele Street at Downsview Park, which was the old RCAF Station/CFB Downsview) have displays of aviation art on this spring/summer. The CAvM showing is Artflight 2005 (theme “Northern Wings”), and opens Thursday, May 12; the TAM one is the Canadian Aviation Artists’ Association’s touring “Millennium Collection” and opened this past Saturday. Both collections also have Lancasters on site (CAvM’s is KB944, TAM’s is FM104 in the early stages of restoration after 35 years on a pylon beside Lake Ontario).

And this particular Canuck won’t grouse too terribly much about petrol prices…have heard what the stuff is going for in the UK. Geez–! 😮

Cheers

S.

Have you been to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and if so what was your opinion of it. Their website is quite a sprawl to find works.
steve

Hi Steve,

BMFA is a very nice Museum they have a rather nice collection. send me an e-mail at [email]b25j@maine.rr.com[/email] I can give you some info.

Cheers
RER

Here are some ideas:

http://www.richard-seaman.com/Aircraft/Museums/index.html

http://www.richard-seaman.com/Aircraft/Museums/SiteMap.html#MuseumsListedByCountry

Richard.

About 1 1/2 hours North of New York, don’t miss Old Rhinebeck’s collection of mainly 1910-1930 aircraft and replicas. A bit like Old Warden mixed with a bit of theatre, they fly displays every Saturday and Sunday from June onwards.

Try and get a ride with ‘Mad Mike’ in the sightseeing New Standard, particularly to watch the other passengers when he does his ‘disappearing pilot’ trick!

Not a dedicated visit for aviation im afraid. Ottawa seems like a good place to visit. The bus route seems very regular. They have a Lanc too 🙂 No doubt I shall post the pictures on my return.

Thanks for all the info.

Don’t forget the new Steven Udvar Haazy Center at Dulles Airport, its actually a new wing of the NASM. I believe there is a shuttle bus to take you from one to the other, but either way its a must see, so set aside 2 days for Washington DC!

If you can get near Dayton, Ohio (which is about 45 minutes north of Cincinnati), you have to see the USAF Museum. Best aviation related museum in the US, hands down.