The Huey Ride

Don the pilot has 6,000 hours of Pilot in Command in Huey's starting with his training in the Service.
The ride was arranged by Bob, who is a helicopter mechanic and a hell of a nice man. There was 9 of us on board when we took off from the Auburn Airport about 11:00 A.M. on the day after Christmas. Bob as Pilot in Command and Erin as Co-Pilot. Between the Airport and the freeway Bob let Erin take control. She flew us over to the canyon areas and took us down into the canyon a few hundred feet above the river. She took us downstream navigating the very crooked canyon walls all the way to the small damn. She then went back up river and then climbed out of the canyon heading toward the Lincoln Airport. Don had Erin do some flight maneuvers at the Lincoln Airport for a while, then he took the controls back for the flight back toward Auburn. On the way he took us to the Bear River canyon at about 50 feet above the river at about 60 miles an hour. It's impossible to describe how unbelievable of a ride that was. Don being used to flying in wild terrain put that ship to the test. It was the best E Ticket Ride to Disneyland that any of us have ever had.

In the excitement of going to the airport, I forgot to take my camera. Can you believe it? Saying that the ship was almost 50 feet long and used a Jet Turbine engine as it's very powerful power plant doesn't come close to giving anyone a clear picture of this magnificent machine. 

It was one of the best Christmas presents any of us ever remembers in our life.

I went out a week or so earlier and got a few shots of the Huey early in the morning on the way to work. At least you will have an idea of what it looked like.