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Well I just managed to finish a long weekend after having today off. It has been good with my friend Kinny coming to visit for some good Avgeek Times. But I have also tried to be the good host and show him some good touristy things as well.

On Saturday we did 1 or 2 of the usual touristy things, Pikes Place Market, Post Alley, the first Starbucks store

From Seattle Life 2013

you know the usual, but then we also added in some time spotting at SeaTac and being chased off by the cops, which was the first time that has ever happened to me, even back home in Australia it never happened.

Sunday Morning we headed out into “rural Washington” which was really just 10 mins down the road from me towards the East. We went and had breakfast at one of the top breakfast spots in the Greater Seattle area, Maltby Cafe (funnily enough at the end of Maltby Road). It was DAMN awesome and I took the cinnamon roll challenge (not that there really is a challenge but more that eating one is a challenge on its own). It was gooooooood. Way more cinnamony than the one at Skillet but this one didn’t have as good frosting as what the Skillet one does with its warm cream cheese yumminess.

From Seattle Life 2013
From Seattle Life 2013

Kinny got to try his first real American classic being Biscuits & Gravy. Reports were that the biscuit was a bit to heavy. But he still managed to put a good dent in the meal. After that we headed off to Everett for some spotting, then onto Museum of flight and eventually round out the day at Kerry Park for some sunset shots of Downtown Seattle.

From Seattle Life 2013

More spotting today but this time a little bit different. It was actually snowing! The snow was falling but it was so worth it! To be out spotting in the snow as it fell (and at one time was coming down pretty heavy) was pretty neat! But the photos of the snow were not that easy to get 🙁

From Seattle Life 2013

All in all, a pretty awesome weekend! (A post later in the week on the spotting goodness)

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This book was an absolute shocking let down… this is going to be a major rant… be prepared

Untitled

The book is Satire TV by Jonathon Gray, Jeffrey P Jones & Ethan Thompson. The amount of “Authors” should start to ring wedding bells. This is not really a book, its more like an essay. I had originally bought this from Comedy Central back earlier in the year after seeing it online and seeing the description. It kind of read like it was a look at how Daily Show and Colbert report were affecting life. WRONG! So very very wrong. This is more like a bunch of essays on Satire TV. It uses plenty of big words I have NEVER heard of and to be honest it felt like it was mocking the people who don’t are “below” them.

Either way I think it was crap, absolute crap. Just to much like a college thesis about certain parts of television and references to South Park, Simpsons and other unknown reasons what you would consider Satire? If you come across this book for less than $1 give it a go, anything more than that… Forget it!

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I was chasing down a UPS 767 Freighter this afternoon (it left about an hour after I did) and managed to snap a few rare birds flying about. A Southwest 737-700 at Paine Field & a US Army Blackhawk. Add in the Dreamlifter and it wasn’t a bad hour or so.

From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Seattle Spotting 2013

But once I left the Future of Flight I moved over to another side of the field and got a few parked aircraft shots including a truly epic sunset.

From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Artistic 2013

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New Years Eve I was a pansy, I will fully admit that. I piked out of watching the fireworks for spending time in my nice warm bed since it was cold outside. Yes that was a lame decision, but my warm sleepy body overruled spending time in the cold outdoors.

New Years Day though I awoke to what was going to be a fantastic day of sunshine! One thing that is sometimes rare to find is sunshine in winter in the PNW and the first day of 2013 did NOT dissapoint. In fact even though it was freezing cold outside (in the 40s but that did not include wind chill) it was mighty nice to have no rain, no cloud and just brilliant blue sky. I was going to take full advantage of it and get 2 things done.

1. Get up to Kerry Park and take some photos of the Skyline with the Space Needle
2. Spotting at SeaTac since Paine Field is shut down pretty much for the Xmas/NY break.

So that’s what I did, although I did #2 first and #1 on the way home. The weather held, I froze my butt off and the photos turned out pretty damn good if you ask me. The Kerry Park photos got a bonus with Mt Ranier in the background.

While the spotting photos were near perfection as they were landing on 16C and got some of the shots I was hoping for including Emirates, Korean and Lufthansa (though ANA was early… as usual).

From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Seattle Spotting 2013
From Seattle Spotting 2013

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With a new year brings new beginnings. A time now to set those “resolutions” people would say. Frankly I don’t like that word. I am pretty sure I have said it before but resolutions makes it sound like I need to change something. I set myself goals that I want to achieve. That way I can work towards something and there is an end to that process. Whether it be a fitness goal or a travel goal or who knows what, it has to be quantifiable.

I generally have 2 different “Goals” being my Travel and Fitness. These can sometimes inter mingle but usually it is 2 seperate ones.

So for my fitness goals in 2013 they are:

* Run the 10k (at least) at the US Marine Corp Marathon in Washington DC
* Do a Triathlon
* Compete in at least 2 5k (or longer) events in Seattle

My travel goals for 2013 are:

* Add at least one new state to my list of unvisited states (9 out of 50 to go!)
* Requalify for Virgin Australia gold
* Visit OshKosh
* Visit some more local sites around Washington State
* Use up my Qantas Points in some way

I think these set some good goals for me overall on those two counts. In general though I do want to try and strive to get a better foothold at work and see if there is something I can do to keep me wanted around these parts. I also want to see if I can get back into some of the points game over here with some credit card churning etc. I want to try and work on my photography skills and get my photoshop processing more efficient.

I want to also grow my AirlineReporter presence, get some more stories out there on the Avgeek world. I have a few in the plans in my head, but its where/who to pitch to I need to work on. So hopefully I can do something with that in the new year.

Anyway 2013 looks to be a good year either way. It will be my first full year living in the USA and I plan to make the most of it!

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Each year I try to set myself some goals to achieve in 2012 and this year was no different. I set one goal, tick off as many things on my bucket list as possible.

Here is what I managed to complete:

* Fly a Plane
* Cook a Meal for the people in my life who i cherish the most
* Move out of home
* Run on an Airport runway
* Take a Shower, Mid Flight
* Get a flight in a War Bird – Double points if its a B17 (ended up with a B17)

I also really got stuck into this one:

* Read “The Clasics”

So that’s not bad in my opinion for the last 12 months. Moving over here to the USA was a big achievement for me and that was one of my biggest moments in 2012. I did have some pretty amazing other moments as well when looking back, things that aren’t worthy of a bucket list item but still awesome none the less.

* I took my first ever real mileage run and that took me from Brisbane to Mackay & Rockhampton via Sydney and Brisbane again. Along with another one to Canbera via Sydney & Melbourne.
* Bought my truck after moving over here, a dream I have had for quite some time
* I flew down and did some spotting at LAX just for the hell of it on two seperate occasions, along with another one north to Vancouver just for spotting.
* Traveled all the way out to Ohio to see one specific Aircraft the XB-70 and then also getting a chance to touch the YF-12 at the same time.
* Visited my first real US Air Show and got to see a B2 and then an F-22 Raptor at another show.
* Saw both the Blue Angels & the Thunderbirds on seperate occasions
* Stepped foot on my first 787
* Saw my first 747-8 take off and was as giddy as a school girl
* Started doing a bit more blogging and photography on the side
* Got me a Kitchenaid Stand Mixer (sad yes I know but I love it!)
* Got to see a Patriots football game

So much else has happened in the last 12 months but to be honest, you probably don’t care.. but one thing I have enjoyed over the last 12 months has just been the challenges and how I have managed to work through them in the last 12 months. No matter what curve ball was thrown at me, I took it in stride and kept on going. It has been a great year looking back at all the things I have done and places I have visited, people I have met and things I have done.

Next year brings a whole new set of challenges and goals. Looking forward to it!

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Not much text in this one but I wanted to post some of my favourite photos that I have taken over the last 12 months. Not just aircraft (but that will be the majority of them) but a whole heap of different photos.

From Qatar Artistic & Spotting
From Qatar Artistic & Spotting
From Sea Fair 2012 Processed Photos
From Sea Fair 2012 Processed Photos
From Vegas Avgeek Style
From Artistic 2012
From Artistic 2012
From Seattle Spotting 2012
From Seattle Spotting 2012

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Well it is that time of the year again. I am going back over the last year and looking at a whole heap of things that have happened. One of my big things in life is Travel and looking back over the last year dredges up a heap of memories. But I wouldn’t be a true Avgeek if I didn’t keep a log of all of my flights during the year.

The flying wasn’t all of the travelling I did but it does form the largest form of it. But it is always interesting to back over some of the stats of my travel from the previous year. Now 2012 would not be as large as 2011, but I sure did cover some ground!

2012 Flight Map

As you can see in the map, theres a fare amount of distance covered by some of those lines. What you can’t see is the repeated trips to places like LAX, SFO, SYD & MEL. All in all in 2012 I took 34 flights with only 3 “Long Haul” flights (BNE-LAX, BFI-DOH & DOH-IAH) the rest of them were all lovely short segments.

Lets look at some of the geeky stats:

Total Segments: 34
Total Miles: 46676
Shortest Flight: Cleveland to Dayton – 162mi
Longest Flight: Doha to Houston – 8047mi

New Countries: Qatar
New Airports: DAY, CLE, DOH, BFI, LAS, ROK, IAH

New Airlines: QR, AS, QQ, EV, XR, OO, AX
Most Common Airline: Virgin Australia

New Aircraft: 787, CRJ-700, ERJ-145, CRJ-200, Fokker 100, 777-200LR, 737-900
Most Common Aircraft – Boeing 737 (all variants)

That is a lot of geekiness right there. I do keep all of this. But add onto this the move over here to the USA as “Travel”, along with several trips over the border to Vancouver (but since I didn’t fly it doesn’t count).

I did my first ever mileage runs (covered in a different look back) but then I got to fly in some awesome aircraft this year. Out of all of that I would definately have to say the 787 was the highlight. There was trips for work, trips for leisure, trips for spotting and trips for points. All rolled into one and you have a pretty epic year of travelling.

And so you don’t forget, heres links to some of the Trip Reports written along with the photos:

Trip Report – Whale of a Weekend
Trip Report – 5 Flights, 2 Days, 11 Coffees, To many Diet Cokes
Trip Report – Avgeek Easter
Trip Report – Bolting North
Trip Report – 4th July Shenanigans
Trip Report – Labor Day Follies
Trip Report: Vegas… #avgeek Style
Trip Report: Delivering the Dreamliner

Emirates First Class
Status Run Weekend
Visa Interview
Avgeek Weekend
Anzac Day 2012
Emigrating to the USA
Vancouver Weekend
LAX Spotting Trip
USAF Museum
Dorkfest 2012
Vancouver Road Trip
Vegas Avgeek Style
Qatar Trip

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Introduction
Delivery Dinner
Seattle to Doha
Exploring Doha Day 1
Exploring Doha Day 2 & 3
Doha to Seattle
Conclusion

I would have to admit that to say that having to take 4 days off leave for this trip was not worth it would be an utter lie. This was probably one of the most amazing trips of my life. I managed to add a whole heap of firsts to my log book for this trip:

* First Flight on a 787
* First Flight on a 777-200LR
* First Flight on Qatar Airways
* First time to Houston Intercontinental (IAH)
* First time to Doha (DOH)
* First time to Boeing Field (BFI)
* First time in the Middle East
* First ever Delivery Flight

Some of these things I doubt I will ever be able to do again. I mean how often will I get access like this as well. In the time I was away I flew a total of 17328 miles spent over 31 hours in the air and that was only 3 flights. Normally that kind of distance would be spent on a whole heap of flights maybe 6 or 7. But not this time around.

I don’t really know how to top this trip though. Sure I have had some epic trips in the past, and I still have some things to tick off of my bucket list (Around the world in first class I think is the next big one) but all the sacrifices I am going to have to make now that I am back (not that this trip cost me much, but more the fact that my waist line took a bit of a hammering, but I expected that) were worth it. Experiencing new cultures, new foods, new scenes all in a matter of a few days, it is a travelers dream.

Being able to get on a delivery flight was a dream; it is one of those experiences the Aviation Geeks like me just drool over. An inaugural is one thing, but a delivery (or ferry flight whatever you want to call it) is a true privilege. Experiencing the brand new products, new service, all on a brand new aircraft being delivered half way across the world, getting to meet some media in the process, learn from them and being treated like legitimate media was an honor and something I will cherish.

All those things touted by the 787 program by Boeing, the bigger windows, the better cabin pressure and humidity thanks to the composites used. It is all true. I really did feel much better after the landing in Doha than coming back from Doha on the 777. Don’t get me wrong the 777 service and crew were fantastic as well, but I just didn’t physically feel the same and I had been in the air pretty much with a similar time frame/day. I had never really believed it before, but now I do. If I had the choice of a 787 vs. any other aircraft, then yes I would take it without a second thought.

In the future I hope that I get more of these opportunities as I move forward with the sideline stuff. I really have to thank David at AirlineReporter for the opportunity to go, because if it wasn’t for him not being able to, I definitely would never have had the chance to go. Also thanks go to Qatar Airways and their social media/media team. They planned and arranged all of this and for that I am truly thankful. All the hard work they would have had to of gone to for this trip and to invite a lowly blogger along (although I have been promoted to “Lead Correspondent” now) deserves the biggest praise I can give. So with that, I say thank you and next time if I can fly Qatar Airways, I won’t give it a second thought.