Battle Wing 52

What an awesome site for our ground support equipment - next to a B52!

Plane Sight

Hal Mueller, developer of the iPhone aviation software Plane Sight, was able to join us for a flight in Seattle on our Great Pacific Northwest Tour. A pleasure, as several of us at Airship Ventures use his software.

Stillman Syrah

Stillman Brown sends us news of his latest creation:

Ladies, gentlemen and fruit flies, I hereby announce the release of the 2007 Zeppelin Winery Syrah, Monterey; it may be confusing to have a red Zeppelin on the label of a wine not made by "Red Zeppelin Winery" but the vineyards and winemaker are the same; only the artwork and trademark are new.  (Yes, I still make the other Zeppelin wines, of hue diverse.)  The new release isn't a WMD (Wine of Mass Destruction) as the finished alcohol is under 14%; our neighbor the Uber-Chef and advanced sommelier even accused it of being a food wine.  He finished the bottle, too.  (We served it at the "Wet Zeppelin II" dinner, amusing photos and comments are at WetZeppelin.com )

The front label in all its glory is shown below, from a painting we commissioned by the awesome Adam Licsko.  The wine is all Bear Valley Vineyard from remote Monterey County, and is over 99% Syrah for once with bright red fruits, smoke and cedar, and the finish is long and spicy.  I'm keeping a weather eye on the weather for shipping purposes, but cooling trends are coming so kindly let me know if you'd like some.

I have not personally tried this new creation, but the last Zeppelin themed wine Stillman did, "White Zeppelin Voignier" was fantastic.

For more info, head over to his new website, ZeppelinWinery.com

Signing the Flight Certificates

Oliver signing the days flight certificates.

We are doing some demo flights today to expose the ship and test out the routes for our "Whidbey Island" and "Seattle" flightseeing tours.

Boeing Future of Flight Museum

Eureka, as seen from the "Stratos" event deck at the Boeing Future of Flight museum.

The local economic development council graciously invited us to participate at their summer networking event tonight.

(Click the image to see a larger version to best make out the airship on the field)

2nd VIP Flight Departs

2:30PM Arrival Paine Field

University of Washington

Space Needle

Approaching Downtown Seattle

Tacoma Narrows Bridge

Start of Waterway

Mt. Rainier

Dry Dock

Train Station

Downtown Portland and Pioneer Square

Dredging Sand from the River

Island Living

Shopping in Lake Oswego

A nice view of the Millennium Plaza Park at Lake Oswego.

The Letter B

Just across from Aurora airport, the letter b.

Kate has a collection of letters from the air that would make a great poster.

8:45am Departure

Seattle Bound

Salem was a great success. We sold out the entire weekend, and started a waiting list for the possibility that we offer flights on the way back home in September.

As in many cases, it was the people we met that made it special -- from flying farmers over their own fields, to Naval Airship Veterans, to WW2 pilots that had flown missions over Friedrichshafen Germany and proud grandparents with their beaming grandchildren, the joy of airships was being felt in Oregon, and we look forward to being able to return in the future.

Now we head for Seattle.

Follow us here on the blog and on the tracking page as we make our way to Paine Field in Everett and look for us in the skies over Everett as we fly press and dignitaries this afternoon.

We will begin offering passenger flightseeing tours later in the week. To book, just call our reservations specialists at 650-969-8100x111.

We can't wait to see the sights of Seattle, and we hope as many of you as possible will join us!

Overnight Parking Rates

So... How much for a Zeppelin?

Paddle Wheeler

OHSU

Boats on the Lake

Lake Oswego

On the way to downtown Portland, Lake Oswego below.

Kate's star turn.

Pilot Katharine Board explains her story to the press at Salem airport.

Salem Capitol

Hello Salem!

Corvalis

Home of Oregon State University.

Make Hay

Flying over lots of haystacks and bales of straw.

Eugene airport

The tower asked us to drop by - not everyday a Zeppelin comes to town.

Stadium

Baseball in Eugene

I hope we didn't interrupt play too much!

Approaching Eugene, OR

Roseburg Airfield

Looks like they have enough space if we needed to land there!

Roseburg Indians!

Game in play.

Bridge construction on I-5

We just passed a place called Lookingglass.

Myrtle Creek

Making good time towards Salem, and passing lots of small communities on the way.

Canyonville

Dam And Shadow

Power

The pylons march across the mountains.

Logging

I'm sure you can imagine the views of all the forests from up here. But trees mean wood is abundant.

Grants Pass

Following I-5

Off mast 0803

On our way to Salem. We will be back around Sept 9 to Medford. Thanks for being so hospitable to us!

Run ups

One of our two new crewmen, Alex, mans the extinguisher during the engine run ups.

Briefing

Kate conducts a briefing before we get ready to leave for Salem. We will be leaving in about 40 minutes. Look out for us en route!

A bit of a sort out

While on the transit to Redding, as we had no passenger aboard, I took the opportunity to have a sort out. Under the rear love seat is a storage cubby where we keep many things like the seat belt extenders, children's life vests, manuals, the spare toilet roll, and the clean up kit for sickness or other bodily fluids. There's also a roll of duct tape. Fortunately we've not had to use the latter!