A childhood best friend and I decided to do a 30-year reunion-type girls’ trip to London this year. Well…that’s what it turned into anyway!
Originally, we had planned to do a Millennial-focused podcast – London travel being part of the content gathering for the purpose. However, we ended up making the trip a fun-only kind of thing after some schedule reflection.
That said, my apologies for the low-quality video and photos! The intention was just to be background b-roll while discussing a variety of related things, and I didn’t bring a separate camera outside of my iPhone. I hope there’s still something interesting I can share here, though.
Enjoy!
Short Sunderland MR5
I’m a huge sucker for sea planes, especially big beautiful ones like this Sunderland. I think I spent more time admiring this lady than anything else. I was able to walk through it, too – video is on my Flickr gallery if you’re interested!
A pure flying boat, the S.25 Sunderland was developed by Short to meet requirements of the British Air Ministry for a general reconnaissance flying boat. The S.25 first flew on October 16, 1937.
Hawker Siddeley Buccaneer S2B
This Buccaneer had some serious character to it! Lots of aviation art all around. It may not have legendary history or anything, but at least the pilots seemed to have enjoyed it plenty.
Royal Air Force Buccaneers were designed by Blackburn Aircraft (later Hawker Siddeley Aviation) to a naval requirement for a carrier-based, low-level maritime strike aircraft. They entered service in 1962, first saw combat during the 1990-91 Gulf War (Operation ‘Granby’), and were retired in March 1994.
Avro Lancaster Mk I
This was my second favorite plane at the museum (after the Sunderland flying boat). The energy around that plane, emphasized by its dark paint job, extensive hits, and haunting Goering quote, was pretty incredible. You’ve got to see this one in person if you haven’t – put it on the bucket list!
Fun Fact: The average Lancaster’s life expectancy was 21 operational sorties, but this Lancaster flew a total of 137! There are even stories online about its being haunted by a pilot still readying for a mission. I might look into that later…
Eurofighter Typhoon DA2 Prototype (and someone being silly – hey, that’s me!)
I really love the black color of this jet. Maybe there’s a pattern here…
Okay, those are just some of the highlights from this trip for me and a few thoughts I had along the way. The full gallery is linked below. Check it out, and have fun!
Thanks for reading!
Comments are closed