March 97, I was training for my pilot’s license in St Charles, Missouri, near St Louis. There were serious floods over Missouri and neighboring states. The Mississipi River was the culprit.
funny feeling to fly overhead such a devastated area…
following the River, some cliffs.
something of Belgium?
once in a while, even the best succumb for a silly picture…me at the controls of a Mitchell B25.
but I flew this vintage one, not so glorious I agree. An Aeronca Champ. ‘Champ’… except for the name, there was not much champ about it. But made in 1946, fabrics, wood, start the engine by hand, hardly no instruments…that appealed to me. And still does.
after my final exams and the hangover*, I was itching for good weather. It had been pissing rains for weeks…so the Gateway Arch or Gateway to the West is all I saw of St Louis. It looks like I didn’t miss much according to the grapevine…The Route 66 starts in Chicago but I jumped on it here. Too bad for the 500 km stretch I missed. I had invitations to many places in America, as there were few Missourian student pilots at the flying school. But Route 66 or at least part of it, and the famous parks rank top on my list. The old car I had bought was an old Dodge. From Europe that sounds like a mythical name. A name associated with a muscle car, right? Nope it was just a small car based on a French design, the Horizon Talbot, nothing juicy really. I was tempted by a superb Chevrolet Stingray from ‘65 but the guy wouldn’t bargain. Africa was for later. The Americans can’t build or manufacture anything small so they buy designs somewhere else. I can hear my chauvinist friend Damian W say “Dude, we leave the small shit to the rest of the world to keep it busy”.
* one of the rare hangovers in my life as I normally don’t drink. But there was no way to escape from fellow pilots: threats, sweet talking (something with Belgians and beer), promises of hot chicks at the bar, pole dancing…they would have attached and feed me the medieval way otherwise.
weather got better in Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas but it went awful again in New Mexico. Sante Fe was blocked by a snow storm, unreachable by normal road. Pretty sad…something cultural for a change would have been nice. So I sped up to Arizona.
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