Monthly Archives: July 2014

Treasure Island Air Terminal

wpid9844-AU0E6883.jpgMy sister is a bit of a fan of architecture so, as part of our travels around the Bay Area, we stopped off on Treasure Island. The old air terminal building which the US Navy inhabited until handing it to the City of San Francisco when they closed up shop is an art deco structure that I thought might be worth a look. As it is a city building, it is open on weekdays. I had only been there during the weekend so had not been able to go inside. This time we were able to take a look around.

wpid9840-AU0E6853-Edit.jpgInside is a huge mural covering a historical view of Navy activities including some projections of the future which are still a bit ahead of where we are. The guard on duty was a very friendly guy who knew plenty about the building and its history and was happy to tell us all about it.

wpid9838-AU0E6841-Edit.jpgThe interior is a good match for the exterior with a lot of art deco features. Most of the building is only for the access of tenants so we couldn’t check it all out but the bits we could see were very nice. As an aside, I used the restroom while there and it was a pretty stunning looking place. The corridor down which you went to reach it was very dull and had the look of many functional governmental decorational styles but entering the bathroom was like entering a movie set. Needless to say, I decided not to go taking pictures in there since that might have seemed a bit weird!

wpid9842-AU0E6881.jpg

Boeing Field

wpid10079-AU0E4499.jpgNo great story for today’s post. I got some time to shoot at Boeing Field in the evening after a day of meetings and travel. Some of the interesting subjects got their own posts. Here are just a few shots of the other traffic that was coming in to the field. The evening light was fantastic and it was fun to watch the movements including some of the Boeing production traffic. Mongolian was a new airline for me. Sadly my timing was off and I didn’t get to see the Indian Navy P-8 on test. Never mind.

Circus Performers

In some of my previous posts I have shown the interior of the building in Oakland in which I work. It is a pretty cool space (unlike our office) and this does make it popular for events. Often we shall be in the office while the event people are setting up outside. Usually that just involves a small stage, tables and chairs and a sound system. However, a few weeks ago we had something a bit more unusual. There was going to be a performance by some acrobats as part of the evening. They were getting their rigging set up and running through some rehearsals. I grabbed some video while they were doing this and below is a sample of what they were doing. Pretty cool stuff and I imagine the attendees at the event enjoyed the full performance. Another guy was doing some amazing stuff spinning a large cube frame around his body but I sadly didn’t catch that on camera.

Dream Machines

wpid10115-C59F4973.jpgHalf Moon Bay on the Pacific coast hosts a great little event each year called Dream Machines. It is a combination of an aircraft and car event. I took a trip with my buddy Hayman to see how it was this year. The weather did not start out favorably and it looked like it might be a bit of a dull day. The clouds early certainly stopped a few visitors from making it in. However, the weather got a lot better as the day went on and there were still lots of great things to see.

wpid10135-C59F5507.jpgDream Machines is not an airshow so there are no displays. However, some aircraft get airborne and might do a few flybys. I covered the event for Global Aviation Resource and you can read my coverage in more detail at http://www.globalaviationresource.com/v2/2014/05/05/aviation-event-review-dream-machines-half-moon-bay/. There are a couple of sad notes associated with this day. The Sanders owned Sea Fury, Dreadnought, was at the event and departed in mid-afternoon. It was closely followed by a Cessna support plane. Unfortunately, en route to their base, they collided over the water and the Cessna was lost along with its pilot. Dreadnought suffered damage but returned to base. Also, as it was his home base, Eddie Andreini was part of the day’s proceedings including flying his Mustang. On the static line was his Stearman and this was the aircraft he was flying at Travis a few weeks later when he crashed on the runway and died. Both losses are very sad and our thoughts are with the friends and families and all involved.

Cuttlefish

wpid9866-IMG_1976.jpgMy sister and nephew came to stay with us so we had a chance to do a few touristy things. This included another trip for me to the aquarium at Monterey. Since I have been a couple of times recently, this time I didn’t take along my camera since I thought I would enjoy traveling light and just looking at the creatures in the collection. However, I did have my phone and couldn’t resist a few photo opportunities. Specifically, we saw a cuttlefish exhibit that I seem to have missed on my previous visits.

wpid9868-IMG_1979.jpgCuttlefish are fascinating creatures to me. The aerodynamicist in me loves their use of their control surfaces to move in any direction with supreme control. Plus, they look as much like an alien as anything out there and change color at will. I was fascinated by them and one of them seemed to be quite taken with me as it moved face to face with me and waved its tentacles at me. Not sure if this was friendly or threatening but, with some thick glass between us, I wasn’t too bothered. We probably won’t be back there too soon but when we next go, I shall be sure to pay them another visit.