San Jose, CA Fly-in on Jan 9th

[mjc]

On every second Saturday, the Reid-Hillview Airport Association holds a Historic Aircraft Display Day and invites airport tenants and pilots based at nearby airports to show off their aircraft. It's typically a small group that has a good time telling "there I was" stories over airport BBQ. The next one is next weekend, January 9th, so I challenged the Vintage Mooney Group to show the RHVAA what a fly-in BBQ is all about by festooning the ramp with Mooneys of every type and color!

To add a bit of holiday flavor, I've added a White Elephant gift exchange to the agenda after lunch. Each person can participate by bringing a WRAPPED "aviation" related gift. You shouldn't have to buy anything; it can be something in your hangar or garage that you don't want anymore, or has a story behind it (good gift: used pilot supplies; bad gift: used oil filter). Then, one at a time, a participant can do one of two things: select an un-opened gift, or steal a gift that someone already opened. A particular gift may only be stolen 3 times. The gift should not be too valuable, but it must be wrapped or bagged.

The long range weather forecast (which is, I know, next to useless) looks promising. See http://www.vintagemooneygroup.com/PRERHV2010.htm for more info and to let us know you're coming (it helps us plan the food to buy).

 

[Sven]

We are registered and excited to attend our first VMG fly-in. We tried making to the Tahoe event but turned back because of weather. I'm hoping our usual Santa Rosa marine layer burns off in time for a morning departure. We look forward to connecting with other Mooney drivers and sharing a few common experiences. We're bringing our fixed-gear Mooney which is an oddity. A couple of times ATC has reminded us to put our gear up. We'll see what happens at RHV.

[mjc]

It looks like this is shaping up to be a fun event. If everyone who registered attends, we'll have 47 people coming in 22 Mooneys. That's a good deal more than I expected for a humble winter airport BBQ. If everyone participates in the white elephant gift exchange, it will really be a lot of fun.

 

[Sven]

I'm bummed we could not make it. It's 2:30 now and KSTS is still IFR like it's been all week. I guess I'm going to have to work on my IFR ticket. I hope everyone that made it had a great time.

[mjc]

It was IFR at Reid-Hillview up until around 11:30am. Three Mooneys already at Reid were there earlier, but the other six arrived once the weather lifted a bit. In all, the Mooney group was represented by 23 people by my count. For a winter fly-in, I would call it a success. Folks seemed to have a good time eating the BBQ burgers, walking the flight line, and chatting about flying. We skipped the white elephant thing due to the low turnout. I was sure looking forward to seeing a fixed-gear Mooney; perhaps at an upcoming event. I sent some photos over to the VMG board to put up on the website, so eventually it should appear there.

[mooneygirl]

Michael, sorry to hear the weather didn't cooperate for your event.  It will be fun to see the photos on the VMG website, or shoot them to me and I can put them on the FB page for the Ambassadors.  Happy New Year!

[mjc]

It think the fly-in worked out pretty well given the weather. Winter fly-ins are a crap-shoot anywhere, California included. Thank you for the offer to post the photos. I'll see about sending some over. I don't have a group shot; I wish I'd remembered to get everyone lined up for a group photo, but I didn't.

In the meantime, a write-up and some photos got posted to the VMG website:

http://www.vintagemooneygroup.com/SanJose2010.htm