Air Camping at Historic Columbia California

Some pilot's have a secret - air camping. Air camping is like regular camping, you arrive, set up your tent, eat under the stars, have a fire and marshmallows and a hearty breakfast over a wood stoked fire the next morning before you leave. Except in Air Camping, you don't drive in, you fly in.

There is a network of air camps around the country - some better known than others. One of my favorites is at Columbia CA. The campground is located along a grass strip, and all manner of aircraft can be found one the line. It's easy to find, it's about 45 miles north of Modesto and on all maps, but you have to research a bit to learn about the campground.

On one trip in my Aeronca - NC 3236E -  flying north to watch my brother graduate from Chico State, I camped overnight at Columbia. Touching down on the soft grass felt like a dream, and my Aeronca Chief came to a gentle taxi speed without any additional input from me. Turning off the runway I say a Stinson with space next to it and pulled alongside. As I got out to admire the view and take photos of the moon rising as the sun set, A pristine red Taylorcraft flew overhead. My feeling was right, it turned out, the pilot was looking down as I looked up. He circled back and entered the pattern, touching down just as the light faded away. It turned out he had just won 'best-in'class' at the antique aircraft show in Watsonville and was heading home. Looking down and seeing all the tailwheel aircraft, he decided to stop overnight in Columbia. We spent several hours that night talking around a campfire before retiring to a peaceful sleep.

Waking up at an air campground is different. No screaming, singing, or otherwise annoying signs of typical camp life. Everyone gets up peacefully and respectfully  and goes about their business, breaking camp and loading their airplanes. Soon the grass field was left to me and a few other planes. I had a different goal for half that day. I was going to visit the historic section of Columbia, the part made a state park and honoring California's gold rush years. It's a living museum of sorts - you can even ride a horse-drawn stagecoach down Main Street, then try your hand at really panning for gold.

The story of how Columbia became a State Park is fascinating in itself. Basically a dentist and his wife were friends with then-governor Warren in California, and despondent at the decaying condition of the town and the potential loss of its historical value, they worked together and had it declared a state park. Governor Warren went on to be on the Supreme court.

But there is more to the story. The dentists wife was Geraldine McConnell and she lived to be 99.  Part of the deal about the town becoming a park was for Geraldine to live in her house as long as she lived. So she became the last resident of the historic town. Traveling once to the town with a friend who became the state historic architect, we got a tour inside the house from Mrs. McConnell. She was proud of it's history and spoke of many movie stars they'd hosted and the movies filmed in and around their home. The most famous was 'High Noon' with Gary Cooper. The house where Gary Cooper's character comes to recruit help to fight off the 'Miller gang' is the McConnell house. More can be learned at these links: http://www.movie-locations.com/movies/h/highnoon.html and http://www.columbiacalifornia.com/mcconnell.html Here's a photo from the trip we took to visit Mrs. McConnell.

If you want a fun destination where you can stay overnight in hotel or camping, fly in and visit a restored gold mining town - Columbia is the place, even if you just want to sit by a fire and watch the moon rise into a darkening sky over a field of antique aircraft at rest for the night.

Accessing the AN 124 cockpit with a Bic Ballpoint Pen

Getting into the Cockpit of a Russian AN 124 with a Bic Ballpoint Pen turned out to be easier than you might think. San Diego Brown field was hosting the largest airshow in the world outside the Paris airshow, and it was just after the cold war. The AN 124 was a surprise addition to the show, sneaking up and landing, almost effortlessly, despite it's enormous size. The school bus on the taxiway on the other side of the runway shows the scale for this airplane - at least two school buses could drive side by side into the plane, with room to spare. 

As it turned off the runway and came towards me, it's size was gigantic! At least two homes could be built inside it's fuselage. Nobody was supposed to go near it. Nobody really knew how to act with the Russians, and besides, we didn't speak their language. But the Navy pilots had a plan, and they found the Russian pilots, and a lot of hand gesturing occurred then an opportunistic Navy pilot came to me (the driver of the transport golf cart) and said: 

"This is your chance - take us out to the AN -124 and we can probably get you inside with us."  So now we were heading past all the barriers, a couple of Russian pilots, two Navy pilots, all in uniforms or flight suits, and one skinny young flight instructor kid, driving the golf cart -  and the pilots were getting waved through past security!  I stayed silent, but I was glad I had my camera in my backpack. 

At the transport plane, the pilots gathered around, pointing and talking. Another golf cart came out, this time a pilot brought his girlfriend or wife. A navy pilot came up to me, grinning ear to ear.

"What do you have to trade?" he said

What do you mean?"  

"If you have anything to trade them, trade it, and they'll take you inside!" 

I assessed what I had. I didn't want to trade my camera. "Will this work?" I held up a Bic pen. 

"Let's go see." he said, so we walked to the gaping rear ramp, where one of the Russians was on guard. I held out my pen. The Russian looked at it, took it, smiled, and we were in! 

It took a while to walk through the cavern of the airplane, and at the other end of the cargo bay, we started climbing a small steep ladder to the flight deck. Inside, I was amazed. Everything was spotlessly clean, but there wasn't as much electronic gear as I would have expected. Everything, even the switches, were large. 

I wasn't sure if I would get in trouble if I tried to take a picture, nobody else had their cameras with them, and at best it would be uncool, and at worst, maybe commit an international offense. So I waited for the others to all be looking elsewhere, and I took a quick picture of the most interesting thing close to me, which looked like a systems control panel for the aircraft. Note the Russian lettering. 

Too soon it was over. One of the Navy pilots started looking concerned, and said "We have to get back." So we all went down the stairs and rode the golf cart back to the public side of the yellow tape. 

I will always remember how happy that Russian looked to get that Bic ball-point pen!

Onwards & Upwards,

Rob Bremmer

Joyriding in the Concorde - Pattern work, supersonic style!

Pattern work is about circuits; up and down, round and round, in and out, and back to where you started on the airport. But I noticed a funny thing, the faster the plane, the longer it takes. With the Concorde, one circuit takes about an hour, as it turns out.

It was the last century, and I was just starting as a flight instructor in San Diego. Some Admiral decided (and good for him!) that it was time to put San Diego on the map with an international airshow - a big one! So they committed to ticket sales and marketing, and found people from around the world to bring interesting aircraft. Only the best.

To staff the event, they recruited pilots and flight instructors from the region - free access to the shows, in exchange for running crowd control on the ramp, handling radio calls on the hand-held as needed, and keeping small children from being sucked up by jet engines on the taxiway.

That's how I found myself on Concorde duty. My job? Look official, and keep the crowd to the edges of the taxi way and beyond, meaning I had the best view possible. The promoters sold tickets for rides on the Concorde, about $1,000 a seat, for a departure from Brown Field (SDM) halfway to Hawaii, getting their picture taken by the mach-meter while sipping champagne, and turning around back to Brown for a landing, all within the hour. They had lines of people waiting to go, and ran joyriding light all day!

Going halfway to Hawaii worked out well, when they cracked the sound barrier, they were safely out over the Pacific, nobody was bothered by the sonic boom.

I had mixed feelings watching the comings and goings. I would have loved to take the ride, but if I had the $1,000 disposable cash (which few young flight instructors possess) I would have sooner converted it into 12 hours of Multi-Engine time. Those passengers were looking very happy as they deplaned, though!

Thinking back, the most striking aspect was the sound. The whole process and watching the takeoffs and landings was fantastic, but it was other-worldly to hear the power in the thrumming high speed shriek of those engines, moving the plane along the taxi-way then roaring to life for the takeoff. To stand next to it, 40 feet away, was to be awed by the power and potential of those engines. Truly a memorable day!

(And I'm glad I found all my old flying slides in the box at the back of the garage)!

Onwards & Upwards,
Rob Bremmer

"Blackbird Singing in the Middle of the Night"

So here's the full story. When I lived in San Diego and ran my little flight training business, I accidentally came into a situation where I could and did, perform a favor for the US Navy. Here's how it unfolded: 


One day, while flying my Aeronca out in the back country, I got into some low level lift with some hawks and followed the lift, being mindful of the chaparral hillside close below. Suddenly a metal shape loomed up from the hillside - a green oblong cylinder. I dropped a little lower and made a second pass. It was obviously military and I guessed a fuel drop tank, it didn't look like any typical guided explosives. On a hunch I circled up a few thousand feet for a better look. Yup! Sure enough, I was on the extended center line for Miramar, but many miles up into the back-country. I took two sight lines and estimated it's position. 


Later that weekend, I told my neighbor, who I knew as  Master Chief at Miramar. He listened to my story with a smile and said 'That's interesting!"


The next day was Monday. At work in El Cajon I heard several large helicopters, and stepped outside for a look. There were two Navy choppers, heading in formation to roughly where I'd flown that weekend. 'Coincidence.' I thought, and went back to work.


That night my neighbor came over all smiles and exuberant. "I have permission to extend a special 'thanks' to you!" He said. Turns out, I found a Navy drop tank they'd accidentally released on a landing at Miramar coming in from the east, and they had no idea where it was. "We hoped we found it before a hiker did." he told me. They were glad it was found by a pilot and not some kid hiking in the wilderness. 


My reward was wonderful - half a day spent flying the F-14 full motion sim and the full dome sim (A big deal back then) and some time flying the E2-C, which flew just like the twins I knew, just with more power. I got an escort through the sim area, and an official Navy flight jacket with my name on the leather patch and the title 'Instructor',  and I got this photo.


Now, about the photo. It was relatively fresh, taken from the forward turret camera of an F-14 flying cover for the refueling mission. I was told the image was shot from many miles away, and it is IR enhanced - that's why the odd colors, and the glow on the SR-71 nacelles is engine heat. The optics and tracking capabilities are amazing when you think the target aircraft must have been flying at least 250-300 mph, and the camera plane, much faster than that, flying towards them and looking down at an angle, and tracking the target ship through cloud cover as well!


Our pilots do amazing things, things most of us will never know. Here is just one hint at the edges of what they do or did, in daily life. 


Onwards & Upwards,
Rob Bremmer