Visiting the Museum of Flight

posted by Jeff | Sunday, December 20, 2009, 12:45 AM | comments: 0

One of the cool perks at work is that we get something called the Prime card. We get discounts all over the place with it. One of the most compelling things is the discounts at the various museums. With the recent fanfare of the Boeing 787 first flight, it got me to thinking about the Museum of Flight next door. It was only three bucks for each of us, instead of $14.

It's a pretty cool place. They have a barn that was apparently used by William Boeing at the birth of the company to build his first planes. A two-story building has WWI and WWII planes from all sides. The big main building has a mix of jets, military and commercial. The outdoor area has one of the Concordes, a 707 used as Air Force One for Kennedy and Nixon (you can go inside both), as well as the original prototypes of the 737 and 747.

It was pretty cool overall, though the best collection of military planes I've seen is still the Air Force's museum in Dayton (which is free). I think they have the other similar plane that served as Air Force One during the same time. The overall presentation, especially in the World War galleries, is really outstanding. Lots of great text and short video pieces. WWII is always interesting to read about, because had Hitler not been so crazy and expanded to fronts in the Soviet Union and Africa, all of Europe might be speaking German today. Very scary.

We intended to go downtown after going to the museum, since I've not been in Seattle proper yet. The intention was established yesterday when the forecast for rain was only 20%. But it was quite steadily raining. After trying to find food nearby, and witnessing the hell of last-weekend-before-Christmas traffic, we gave up and headed back home. I was crabby and hungry and Diana was getting all kinds of uncomfortable from Baby Puzzoni.

Still, good to get out, enjoy some very cheap entertainment and at least see downtown, even if we didn't get in it. Last night, Diana went to a knitting gathering at a yarn shop and met some folks. It's starting to feel like we actually live out here.


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