Cutting Loose!

After constantly practicing how to fly the Boeing 737, and how to use all the technology inside of its cockpit, I took it upon myself to just have a little fun in my all time favorite plane, the Supermarine Spitfire Mk IX!  This gal is fast and agile for a World War II Piston Engined aircraft, and has been my favorite plane since I was just a little kid watching movies such as The Battle of Britain.  All my life I have never been able to get enough of the Spitfire, and one day during the summer I found a download for Microsoft Flight Simulator X to fly this amazing bird.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

I know this isn't a part of my training as my blog intends, but I wanted to share with the readers (which I guess is really just Jeff) how I came to love flying airplanes as much as I do, and the multitude of photos I took should help explain this.  I am personally a lover of flying fast and low, a fighter jock if you will. And you'll get a taste of this from the images that I took in the two scenarios, one just flying on a gorgeous day, the other above and in the midst of very thick fog.  My landing in the second was atrocious but that's because I wanted to nab a shot of it for you guys.  I hope you like it, cause I know I certainly did.

While looking at the images of my Spitfire among the clouds, this poem came to mind, please think of it as you go through the pictures:

High Flight

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air. . . .

Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

— John Gillespie Magee, Jr

John Gillespie Magee, Jr's Spitfire