What to do with your mom. Day #4

Today, I decided to take my dear mother for an aerial tour of the area. We had low clouds, high winds, and a fair bit of convective activity today, but weather says that it's probably the best day we'll get all week, so...

We took off behind one of the Air Force C-5 Galaxys who was obviously in a hurry, because he taxied out and took off as soon as he hit the end of the runway--no sitting around at the Hold Short line doing a checklist for this guy.



We got up and it was pretty turbulent but not unbearable. I'd planned two long trips for today, one a primary and one a back-up in case weather was bad along the first route, but both destinations were IFR today so we just stayed local.

So I went south a bit, then hedge-hopped over the ridge to the west and found a new skeet range that I'd not seen before.


Then I saw berms and firing lines and recognized where we were: over the Peacemaker Range in Glengary, WV.

Some of you will recall that we had a Wounded Warrior fundraiser shoot there two years ago. (We'll be doing another one this year yet, just not there. Stay tuned for updates.) In fact, we shot in this range:



The pace seems to have grown a bit since we were there. The skeet range is new, and they've got other ranges too now, it appears.

It's a nice secluded place, but there's no hiding from the eye in the sky.


However, courtesy of the convection, we were getting bounced around pretty good, and there were a couple of rain squalls moving through the area, which kept things interesting for me but taxed my mom a bit so out of respect for her tummy we cut the tour short and went back into the airport. The winds were brisk but right down the runway, and I greased it in with nary a bounce and taxied back to the parking area. I made up for the short flight by taking her to a great little Thai place out past the Llama farm. She'd never had Thai before, but the Thai iced tea, Chicken coconut soup and Shrimp Pad Thai won her over. In fact, she was so satisfied that we only had to stop at two antique stores on the way back here. (Of course had we drove past a third one on the way, I'm pretty sure that we'd have had to pop into that one, too.)

Now she's out on the deck brushing Murphy, and he's in his glory.

How come she can brush him and he likes it, but when I do it, I get nipped at?