I was able to go to the Friday event. Found a good place right on the water, and although I had an umbrella for shade, the kind folks behind me let me slide back under their gazebo. There were only two of them and they had plenty of room, and I very much appreciated that! I had plenty of water in a cooler, but I still had issues when leaving; climbing off the beach afterwards got me overheated, so I sat in the burger place under a ceiling fan with a towel and some ice water, soaking the towel and putting it over my head for a while.
I was a gorgeous clear day, but
very hot, mid-90s.
Show started with a sport seaplane and an amphibian. The small one is an Icon A5, and the large one is a Grumman Widgeon.
The Coast Guard did a rescue swimmer demonstration. I set the shutter down to 1/60 to get rotor blur.
I forgot to speed my shutter up after the helicopter, so I had almost nothing useful from the aerobatic performers that followed. The actually tumble fast enough to ruin shots at 1/60th... I'm amazed I even got these! I saw Kevin Coleman in the Extra 300 SHP, Ken Reider and Adam Baker from the Redline Aerobatic Team, Skip Stuart in his biplane Prometheus, then Patty Wagstaff, and finally Gary Ward in the MX2.
Kevin Colemans' entrance
The Redline pair
Gary Ward's amazing nose-up hard bank flat pass
They had a half-hour break and let people back into the water, then Fat Albert arrived. (I still haven't moved my shutter speed up properly...)
Then the Blues!
Heat haze!
Sneak pass! I was zoomed in too tight to get the wake on the water, which makes me very angry with myself...
Apparently I was
right at show center!
This may be he best crossing shot I've ever gotten
And their finale fan break
