A Silly Grin In Tucson - #10

Friday 13 April

Well my sinuses woke up in Arizona anyway. On a beautiful Tucson morning. Blue sky, no wind. Hard to believe there's a big storm brewing up north.

Today is Nev's big day, he gets to go to the Pima Air Force Museum. He can tick this one off his bucket list.

First things first, breakie!

Two cups of awful coffee, toast and cereal. Sorry, cranola.

Studied up the route and off we go! Using our $3 discount card for the Air Base we popped in with all the rest of the bus tours, and bought ourselves a tour by tram. Nev, well he was so excited he was dribbling out of both sides of his mouth. He was in aeronautical heaven. I went to keep Nev company but have to admit it was pretty cool. I got to see the actually F18-something that was used in Top Gun, the Iroquois helicopter that was used in Apocalypse Now. An SR71 spy plane, they are huge! Some older planes that at one time carried Truman, Eisenhower, Johnson & Kennedy. Even the plane they used in Dallas on that fateful day. The volunteers are all ex military with Air Force, Marines or Navy, (one of the gentlemen was an retired Admiral from one of the carriers). Very passionate and proud about their past roles and very knowledgable.

Photos - Pima Air Force Museum

Top Gun - Tomcat

Iroqois helicopter used in Appolcolapse Now

SR71 - Blackbird Spy Plane

We were a bit distracted by some 'Warthogs', (can't remember what proper name is but that is their nickname, they are tank busters), doing low passes as they practiced for a big air show that is happening this weekend. They had a refuel aircraft with two Apache helo's following refueling and some others. Would have been a great air-show. I didn't know there were quite a few nuclear warhead silos around Tucson, apparently you even get a tour around one of the disused ones now. A lot of the uranium came from two mines in the Indian reservations, in Arizona. I think Nev would have liked to look at the bone-yard too but time was a bit of an issue.

We left Tucson to head to Phoenix stopping for petrol along the way. I was getting a bit low on fuel and you can't always guarantee there will be services along the way, particularly on an interstate. Again we studied up the route on maps, (the GPS wasn't charged yet), so we wouldn't get lost and we just about made it. Yep, had to pull over and turn the GPS on on my iPhone. Every time I do this it costs me $20 per meg. Data is $10 per megabyte and Maps is a hungry little program. The ole Vodafone bill will have a bit of a sting in the tail next month. Hence my GPS idea, it's going to work out a lot cheaper.

Phoenix is big and fast. It has a ring freeway around it that looks quite compact on the map but the reality is that it is like our Bombay to city CBD   motorway doubled. It wraps around the city with the idea being that you just take to exit you want. It works well but then Pheonix is a big flat spot in the desert. I love the real western type cactuses, (or is that cacti?) that abound everywhere. There must be hundreds of different varity of cactus in Arizona and New Mexico!

We stopped at the motorbike shop to buy a RAM fitting for the bars on the bike for the GPS. They are a lot cheaper in the USA.  Yay, GPS tomorrow! Back onto the ring road and to motel, got in the dark for the first time. All other landings have been in the light. It took a WIFI connection at good old Starbucks to get us thus far, using maps but you guessed it, had to pull over and recheck. Grrrr...

Anyway, everyone staying at the Comfort Inn obviously knew about the food but forgot to tell us because we were the only ones in the restaurant. Apart from the guy in the corner playing a guitar to recorded music. Lloyd was his name and I think he had a couple of his family there as well. Actually he had quite a good voice and could play. I had a very ordinary Caesar salad was lots of lettuce no crotons and scant chicken. Two pieces of bread. Anyway the Fat Tire beer was good, the meal meant I had to have two beers to help wash it done. Can't remember what Nev had but it was a better choice than mine.

I went back to room to catch up with blog and Nev stayed, (I think he quite liked the music), to catch up with texts and emails. He has had to deal with his new house currently been built while away, thank goodness for email, phone & texts. How would we have coped 10 years ago?

Long day but a good one!

Nighty night now!