This morning I spent several hours visiting the National Naval Aviation Museum at the Pensacola Naval Air Station. This is a huge place that covers naval aviation from 1908 through to today with a collection of more than 150 well presented aircraft and helicopters. Not knowing much about naval aviation I joined a fascinating 90-minute tour that ranged from the first plane to land and take off from a ship to the Korean War. The guide was a Vietnam era naval helicopter pilot and he really brought the exhibits to life with insights about the strengths and weaknesses of  different aircraft and humorous anecdotal stories of the engagements and personnel related with them.  The tour had to stop at the Korean War because there was too much to see to be able to get the full story before the highlight of the day.

Pensacola Naval Air Station is the main pilot training station for the US Navy and Marines and is also the home base for the Blue Angels (UK readers – think Red Arrows). On Tuesdays and Wednesdays they practice here and perform their full display for museum visitors. Not only do you get to see the display but there is a full commentary/explanation and you can hear the audio of the leader directing the other members of the team. Unfortunately, my small digital camera does not have a viewfinder and following the planes on the screen in sunshine proved to be difficult but I did manage to capture a few photos and some video. After the show I continued to look around the museum for another hour and the most amazing thing is that the museum and air show are all free.

A couple of snippets of the Blue Angels video are included with the usual road trip map/video (but you will need to really zoom in to be able to click the white marker) here.

After leaving the air station I drove east along the gulf coast to Panama City, Florida accompanied by the best weather I have experienced so far. Today, the only thunderstorm I know of was the one that woke me up about 4:30 AM this morning.

When President George H. W. Bush (the dad) visited the Naval Station he recognized one of the planes as one he had flown while in the Navy. Although the staff of the museum were skeptical he was able to provide documentation that he had flown four missions in it so they have numbered it 41 in his honor (he was the 41st president).
A shot of the Blue Angels in formation
One of the most impressive things I learned from the tour was that more than a dozen of the pristine planes on display had been recovered from the bottom of Lake Michigan which was where the Navy trained its pilots earlier. Sitting outside the museum was this 1950s plane from Lake Michigan, along with several others in various states of restoration.