Travel Archives

Tooling Around Cochise County

I've never forgotten the beauty of the Sonora Desert and southern Arizona, particularly Cochise County. Having lived here for 6 years in what seems like a previous life, I had grown to a point where I took the mountains, the roads, and the impressive wildlife for granted.

This morning I enjoyed an incredible experience. My friends here live on property out in what many folks would consider the middle of nowhere. Every morning there are a large number of birds at their feeders and even more interestingly, a buck and his harem. Arizona mule deer walk through their property and because they share this enclave with humans they have become so familiar that you can feed some of them from your hand.

For the first time in my life I had a wild doe eating feed from my hand this morning. That was awesome.

She was such a gentle animal.

Needless to say, I got photos.

I don't have the ability to upload any photos at this time, but look forward to at least a few once I've returned to Richardson, TX.

Guatemala 2007

I have added a new gallery for my recent trip to Guatemala on my gallery pages. This is the direct link to the Guatemala 2007 gallery, or you can check out that, and the other galleries I have up by clicking on the gallery button at the top of the page.

Dogs and Cats Living Together: World Ends, etc....

'Nuff said.

Well, maybe not. That is in fact a female dog feeding two kittens for those of you who might express doubt.

I shot this on my vacation in Guatemala last week.

The mother cat was gone, the tienda owner didn't know where she was, so the dog became a surrogate mother as her litter had already been given away or taken away.

Always trust a Russian Pilot: Or, How I arrived in Dubai today.

Leaving Iraq is always a bit of a hair-raising experience. Not that any contractor I know here would admit that to you. In fact, it's a bit remarkable that I am admitting that here in this record for your review.

Whether the problems are with the risk of abduction from the Baghdad International Airport*, or the risk of being shot (or worse) while waiting for your plane, the fact of the matter is that there is always more danger there than anywhere else that we might happen to be during the transition process in and out of country.

Don't get me wrong. Baghdad International Airport has come a long way, and photos that I posted here over three years ago would not be possible today due to the throngs of passengers coming and going. While the facility is small, it remains a very busy hub for enterprising Iraqis and foreigners interested in jump-starting the Iraqi economy despite the insurgency.

Processing through is the part of your flight experience, which you inevitably come to expect will be the most potentially stressful part of the trip out of theater. Of course fate may decide to insert something a bit more interesting for you to ponder on the way home.

Always trust a Russian pilot. I have come to know and believe this maxim well in my numerous flights in and out of Iraq. The vast majority of pilots who fly the charters we take happen to be or Russian or Eastern European descent, and while not necessarily the same stock, based on their age it can only be assumed that most of them were trained by the Soviet Air Force or Aeroflot.

Today was a wonderful case in point. We were on final approach to Dubai International Airport, and perhaps 100 feet off the ground, drifting downward to the runway when the pilot aborted the landing. He flew a weaving pattern over the airport as though trying to assert his control over the airplane and through no small amount of skill managed to get us back up in the air and making a new approach.

Some might think that the aborted landing was no big deal. I've been on planes when the pilot aborted before, but this was different. The plane obviously had a problem. The entire time we were passing over the airport the pilot was weaving the plane back and forth as though the controls were stiff or stuck.

I was quite concerned that the mortar that missed me the night before would get a second chance in the form of an aircraft not being able to safely land.

Approximately 20 minutes later, after the pilot flew a figure eight pattern over the city we were back on approach, landing on a different runway. I’m still not sure what happened, but the pilot was being debriefed by Airport Security, Safety, and the Police when I de-planed.

Always trust a Russian pilot.

*Apparently this has become a problem lately as Airport Security mentioned it in the arrival brief we receive when we pass through.

'Twas the night before R&R...

At the moment I'm sitting in my room. As I type this, I know it won't be posted to my blog until at least two days from now. I'm mostly packed, and ready to go on my final R&R. My next trip home will be my last from this project, unless my employer calls me back. I have already mentioned that I'm not coming back on via direct application. Four years is a lot of life to give, especially at the rate of 84 hours worked per week.

However, my impending resignation is not the cause of this post. In fact, but for the events of the last few minutes, I would not be typing this post at all.

Watch a news report, listen to the ramblings of the anti-war crowd and you will arrive most directly at the conclusion that Iraq is an extremely dangerous place. I won't dispute that. I don't think I've ever made the statement that it was safer here than anywhere else, except perhaps the highways and interstates of the United States. After all, I've known more people working here who have died in car accidents on R&R than I have known who were killed in any other fashion here in the war-torn country of Iraq - Mesopotamia for those of you reading the New York Times.

But Iraq has its moments - moments in which I am not fearful for myself, but for the lives of those who work for and with me. Thirty minutes ago I had such a moment. I had finished packing and I was watching an episode of Scrubs on DVD when the deadly sound of incoming shrieked in my ears. A few hundred feet from the place I lay my head, a mortar round impacted. Fortunately, as is generally the case with IDF (indirect fire) attacks, the insurgent who launched the mortar hit nothing. However, for a time, while I waited for information on where the impact may have been, I worried.

I have 20 personnel working on my staff, and I view myself as personally responsible for ensuring they make it home as safely as possible while they work for me.

A few short minutes can be an eternity when you are waiting to find out about the health and safety of the personnel to and for whom you are answerable.

Everyone was okay, and tomorrow morning I board a plane homeward bound. For a couple of welcome weeks I will try and distance my mind from Iraq and the uncertainty of our lives here, with luck my flights home will be less eventful than tonight has been.

Keeping Track of Your Travels and Travel Time

For many of us the amount of time spent traveling from our homes to our vacations, or to the next place we have to go for that big conference or meeting, is just an inconvenience that we don't even want to think about, much less keep track of. For the rest of us though, that select few, who fly so often that the Security desk check-in personnel at London's Gatwick Airport know us by name (more on that later), we might just be interested in keeping track of how very much time we spend in the air.

We might even want to keep track of the countries we visit.

Well, yesterday while looking for a method of real-time logging for keeping track of my travels for both work and play, I stumbled upon this little gem:

Flight Memory enables you to easily keep track of where you have flown and then easily produce maps showing your flight routes.

We'll also tell you your total time in the air, distance flown and even keep track of aircraft types and airlines!

FlightMemory generates a logbook of your personal flights in real time. FlightMemory is great for aviation enthusiasts, flight crews, private pilots and even the casual passenger!

Whether you are a globe-trotting consultant or just starting to keep track of your newborn's flights, FlightMemory is the place to keep your statistics!

I hope you enjoy the resource.