Friday, February 2, 2018

Jupiter Lighthouse, a Falcon 9 launch, and Luke finally flies his RC airplane!

Friends Ange and Ray drove up to spend the day with us in Jupiter.  After catching up in the RV over a dozen fresh, warm donuts brought by Ange and Ray, we left to have lunch in Jupiter.  


The Loxahatchee watershed and the Jupiter inlet have supported continuous human occupation for over 5000 years!  By the time of the Spanish contact in the 1500's, the native peoples had established an inlet fishing village.  

The Jupiter Lighthouse was first lit in 1860.  Except for a brief period during the War Between the States when Southern sympathizers hid and buried the Fresnel lens, the lighthouse has been continuously lit.


Luke took the lighthouse tour, climbed the 105 steps, and got these pictures.  The first is the First Order Fresnel lens.  A first order lens is one with the brightest beam.


View to the East, out into the Atlantic.


View to the West, towards the ICW


On Wednesday we took our time leaving Jonathan Dickinson State Park and arrived at Manatee Hammock Campground around 3:20.  Winding through the narrow campground roads, we couldn't help but notice that EVERYONE was drifting down toward the dock. The reason? A Falcon 9 launch from Cape Canaveral in 5 MINUTES!!!! You cannot imagine how quickly we got the RV parked and ran to the shore.  Just in time to watch the rocket lift into the sky!


Up, up, and away she went.  It was so exciting!


Manatee Hammock in Titusville is where we spent several weeks last winter.  It is nice to be  catching up with friends back again from last year.  One special friend, John, is mainly responsible for getting Luke excited about trying remote control airplanes again.  With his new Cub RC plane, we headed off to a RC flying field today with John and his wife Janet.  John and Luke carefully checked and prepared the Cub for her maiden flight.


John is an instructor and knew just how to get Luke comfortable in his first flight, along with saving the integrity of the airplane itself (i.e.  no pieces of shattered plane)

Up into the air she went under John's guidance.  That yellow "hawk" coming in over the guy's heads is the plane.


John gave Luke opportunities to guide and fly the plane once she was in the air, eventually getting Luke to the point of being able to take off from the ground and fly.  John smartly landed her.

Luke FINALLY has the remote control in his hands and is flying his plane!


There will be many more lessons and guidance as Luke becomes more comfortable and capable.

John brought one of his many planes to fly also.  Boys and their toys....


The nice day ended with a campfire at John and Janet's RV site, along with several other campers.


The adventure has just begun...

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