A Journal, with Pictures

On Thurs­day July 5th. Joyce and I launched ear­ly from Hilton Head Island for Day­ton. Three hours lat­er we touched down in Day­ton and Joyce head­ed to our Day­ton home. I refu­eled N426GW and was joined by my fly­ing bud­dy Bill McN­abb for the four plus hour flight to Duluth. We bucked head winds the whole way, but safe­ly arrived for the Cir­rus Own­ers and Pilots annu­al get togeth­er. I must admit, I was one tired pup­py since I woke up at 5:00 AM to start the trip. After meet­ing some fel­low COPA board mem­ber and a show­er I was ener­gized for the evening event, the COPA Cabana, where every­one gets togeth­er. I had lots of con­ver­sa­tion with old friends and a chance to meet new ones. The next day opened with the annu­al meet­ing, then sem­i­nars and the day end­ed with the COPA gala din­ner at Duluth’s train depot muse­um. We had a delight­ful evening with great din­ner part­ners, then it was off to bed. Sat­ur­day morn­ing we attend­ed Rick Beach’s annu­al safe­ty pre­sen­ta­tion which was great. Bill and I had to leave ear­ly to return to Day­ton for the Day­ton Air show, but even cut short, it was a great event. Andy Niemy­er, with whom I’ve worked the last three years, again did a incred­i­ble job of orga­niz­ing a great event that brought togeth­er 140 air­planes and over 350 participants.This was the tenth Migra­tion event and the theme was home com­ing. Each class going back to M1 had a class pic­ture and I was proud to be with the class of M3.

The flight gods smiled on us on our way back with a nice tail wind that got us back to Day­ton in less than four hours.

But when we land­ed it was HOT!