Week in Review from Maxwell-Gunter

Thursday, 28 February
Maxwell AFB FamCamp — Montgomery, Alabama
Temps: Lo 34F (Forecasted) / Hi 54F (1C / 12C)

It feels like we just arrived at the Maxwell AFB  FamCamp this afternoon.  But that’s an illusion … we arrived a week ago today.  The week has gone by fast.  As a matter of fact, the month has flown by.  Of course, it doesn’t help that it’s a short month ;-)

An easy 204-mile (326 km) drive brought us to Montgomery on 21 February.  (We took the same route as the one we drove when we left here on January 31, so I’m recycling that map for this blog post — just switch the red and the green points.)

We called while we were still in Red Bay to make reservations at the FamCamp, and snagged a great site for our return stay — once again for two-weeks.

Last time, we were in site 61 … second row, third from the end;
nice, but we sure like site 69 better,

Site 69 is at the end of a five-site row; no neighbors on the passenger side, and we overlook an open field with a thicket of trees on the far side.  The adjacent site is closed for repairs, so for this week at least, no neighbors on that side either.  The rate for our pull-through FHU site is $20/night, but we’re getting the weekly rate — seven nights for the price of six.  Pretty darn good.

View of our site from the empty field across from us.
The brown building is the bathhouse, with the laundry at the far end.
The nice thing about the bathhouse is that it is not communal; each door leads
to a private bathroom/shower.  Great for long, hot showers ;-)

Top Left: view from our windshield shows the tent camping area in the distance,
with one of the two lakes just beyond.

Top Right: view from our door.

Bottom: the old section of the campground; mostly long-term campers;
difficult for big rigs to maneuver into those sites.

Every morning, flocks of birds fly out of the treeline to nibble at whatever they can find hidden in the grass and warm themselves in the early morning sunshine. There are American robins, mockingbirds, mourning doves, and red-shouldered blackbirds.  They’re all very skittish and scatter as soon as they sense motion.  I got a few photos, but I’ll have to work on my patience to get better ones.

Mourning Dove

American Robins

We’ve been busy since we arrived, but at a slower pace than usual.  We’re resting up from our whirlwind days in Red Bay, and taking care of chores when the mood strikes us.

Taking advantage of the mostly sunny days, Mui’s been up on the roof to spray it with 303 (UV protectant), and has also done some work on reorganizing the basement bays.  I’ve done a mountain of laundry, and some much needed cleaning.  And, of course, I finished processing a ton of photos to wrap up the posts for our Red Bay saga.

The weather has been quite nice.  Our temps have ranged from a low of 37F (3C) last night to a high of 69F (21C) on a couple of days.  There’s a front coming our way, so it will get a bit colder no doubt.

We’ve had plenty of rain — over 5 inches (127+ mm) in the time we’ve been here.  The hard rains (some with thunder and lightning) came overnight, leaving us with sunny — if cool — days.  Perfect weather for taking long walks.

As the ground has gotten a good soaking, strolling around the lakes has been out of the question.  Instead, I walked the flightline perimeter road, detouring to the air park on one occasion, and to the post office on another occasion.  About 3 miles (4.6 km) each time, with return ride to the campground courtesy of Mui.

This marker, located at the historic air park, honors a program, agreed to by Roosevelt and Churchill in 1941, which resulted in over 4,000 British and Commonwealth pilots being trained in the US by the US Army Air Corps; some at Maxwell Field.

Those of you who are regular readers will recall that I wrote about the historic air park here at Maxwell, which we explored when we were here in January (click for the post).  One of the tributes in the park is to the Wright Brothers.  Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a good shot of it then.  With the cooperation of the sun, I did a little better this time.

The plaque at the monument mentions the cooperation between the Wright Brothers
and the citizens of Alabama in establishing the nation’s first school of civil aviation in
1910.  It turns out that the site of that flying school later became Maxwell AFB.

If you look closely through the base of the monument, you can glimpse “Poopsie”,
which I wrote about in the post I linked to above.

A closer look at Orville in the cockpit.

Something new I found on one my walks — a Northrup T-38A “Talon.”  Actually, new is not the right word, since it was here the last time we stayed at the FamCamp, but it was being painted.  Located not far from the Maxwell Gate, it’s now on display again — all bright and shiny — an appropriate way to welcome visitors to the base.

Northrup T-38A "Talon": the aircraft chosen by the USAF in the mid-1950s to better
prepare student pilots for the latest tactical aircraft that were then coming into
service; first prototype flew on 10 April 1959.  This aircraft served at Edwards AFB in
California; it was dropped from the USAF inventory in April 1971.

My most recent walk took me in the opposite direction along the flightline perimeter road, past the two lakes nearby, and out to the end of the runway.  It turned out to be a walk with entertainment courtesy of the 908th Airlift Wing (USAF Reserve unit based here at Maxwell).  Unfortunately, I forgot to take my camera with me or I’d have some great shots to show you of a C-130 Hercules aircraft practicing touch-and-go landings and low fly-overs.

I may not have photos of the C-130 in action, but here are a couple of shots from my first walk
earlier in the week.  The C-130 Hercules on the left is taxiing into position to roll down the runway.

After the frequent dining-out we did in Red Bay, we’ve been eating at home again now that we’re on a more normal schedule.  Not as much fun perhaps, but definitely healthier meals.  That said, we didn’t say no when Maria and Nigel, whom we met at the Tiffin Allegro Service Center, suggested we get together for lunch in Montgomery.  Thinking that they were already on their way to Pensacola, we were pleasantly surprised to hear from them the night we arrived at Maxwell.  They were still camped at Gunter Hill COE, and we arranged to meet up for lunch on Saturday, the 23rd.

Always good to see friends again and chat about what we’ve all been up to.

Our first choice, an Italian restaurant in downtown Montgomery’s “The Alley” was closed for lunch.  So, we ended up at the Railyard Brewing Co. instead.  The music could have been toned down a bit; otherwise, we enjoyed the pub-like atmosphere.

The Railyard IPA & Cheddar, a beer-based soup garnished with fried onion rings, was good, but a bit salty for my taste.  However, I was very pleased with the Signature Burger I ordered; and Mui was very happy with his Smoked BBQ Bison Burger … both were served on a pretzel bun.  I believe Maria and Nigel were pleased with their choices as well … and we were all charmed by the presentation of the fries in tin pails.

Next time, we’ll try one of the brews; this time, we just enjoyed the food.

Our only real outing this week was today; and it was a short one.  We drove the 7 miles (11 km) to the Gunter Hill COE (Corps of Engineers) campground to check out the sites for a future stay … it’s just too close to Maxwell to be a feasible stop for us this time around as we need a place further south once we leave here.  We really liked what we saw and will make a point of staying at Gunter Hill at some point in our travels.

We were planning to go to Selma on Sunday, but just heard that Vice President and Mrs Biden will be there for the “crossing of the bridge” jubilee.  We’ve spent enough time in DC to know what that will do to the crowds … and the traffic, so we will probably shift our plans around.  Hmmm … I wonder if that means the Bidens will be flying into Maxwell?