aviation museum

A friend had emailed us a link about a museum that has the "Spruce Goose." We thought it was many miles from where we were. But for some reason Greg mentioned it while we were touring with Janeane and Russ. And lo and behold, the museum wasn't really that far away. So on Monday, we drove there on our way onward. And Russ and Janeane joined us. The museum is quite amazing actually, with many many planes, plus other odds and ends.

fyi - The Spruce Goose is a flying boat, built almost entirely of wood (about 95%). It was built by Howard Hughes in the 40s, during WWII. It is absolutely huge! Each wing is longer than a football field. Many innovations that Hughes used on this plane are now commonplace in aircraft and other uses. There is much more info on the plane here.

This is a replica of a plane that is the same type as Snoopy's!!

If you look closely, you can see Greg just itching to take off in this fighter jet. ps - just look at how little the jet looks in comparison to the Spruce Goose.

This was a cool kind of interactive game they had. You stand on a platform, and by changing your balance (lean forward, back, sideways, etc) you move a guy on the screen. One of the guides came over and told me I did really good. It was fun - I could have kept going, but there were some kids waiting. {sigh}