Hi Cal So Cal Heli Adventure
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I'm driving 70 MPH on the freeway as I type this. My laptop is plugged in to the ashtray, and I'm steering with my knee. Don't worry; I'm watching the road, not the keyboard. I know these keys as well as I do my fingers.
I've always been crazy like this though, although sometimes I wonder where I get it. My mother is the type of person that prays to God that the Ferris Wheel ride will end early for fear that it will come off the axel and go rolling down the hill. My father is of a different sort. He would refuse to ride simply because at any given moment, his back could suddenly decide to take revenge against him. I, on the other hand, have always been up for an adventure.
Allow me to set the scene. Dad is freaked out and proceeds to tell me the "horror" stories he's heard about these "heli-tours"; the pilot cuts right, then cuts left, the passengers get sick, everybody is throwing up all over the place, and they vow to him that they'll never take another trip like that again, not as long as they are alive. It would be up to me to convince him that everything would be OK.
Mom's worried, but only because Dad is. His mood has always been the barometer of our own. I find an entry point into the conversation, and make every attempt to put them both at ease. I explain So.Cal. Helicopter's impeccable safety record, boast about their calculated decisions to use what the National Transportation Safety Board considers to be the safest single engine aircraft in production. I even go so far as to paraphrase the brochure, attempting to capture some of the excitement:
"This tour takes you from Montgomery Airport out to the coast of La Jolla Shores, then north to the World Class Torrey Pines Golf Course, makes a 180 degrees turn to the coast of La Jolla Shores and continues southbound over the Coronado Bridge. Then we go on to the beautiful downtown San Diego skyline!”
Fast forward to the airport. Jodi, (my sister) and I are laughing as my anxiety forces Dad to make yet another pit stop at the bathroom. It's getting closer, and the rest of us can't wait to get in the air. As we approach, the small colored dot at the other end of the runway expands to the size of a pilot. He greets us while leaning against his ultra-modern, yet environmentally efficient golf cart. We squeeze into the thing and —.enough of this, let's get to the helicopter adventure.
So we get in. The pilot is a pleasant man by the name of Ruben, and this is his side job. Dad is still freaked, and now Mom is too. The blades start spinning, vibrating faster and faster as the air bends the hairs on my arm toward the open plastic window. Ruben pulls back on the lever, and before I can blink, we're up 10 feet, 100 feet 1000 feet!
There was so little in the way of g-force, that I in fact questioned whether or not I was on a helicopter ride, or indeed in one of those simulators complete with fans and movie screens. The change in temperature and wind pressure assured me that I was actually in the air, flying with the birds, sitting shot gun to my overanxious parents.
They did finally calm down though, once they realized that it was too late to go back. We were up there now, completely at the mercy of a pilot dressed in beachwear, following the veins of the Earth to the sea. We took a shortcut over everything (the quickest way from point A to point B is a straight line).
The tour starts over La Jolla — beautiful, rich, La Jolla!
Southward we took a stroll by Black's Beach — infamously known as the "nude" beach of San Diego. Below, the ant-sized smattering of skin colored creatures walked free, naked, and well. Naked (and to answer that question that you may or may not have formed yet in your head, at 1000 feet, you can't make out much other than the patterns on the sand below the rocks). We flew next to the cliffs, gouged and roughly cut the way a giant piece of fudge looks after taking a bite.
Onward to Pacific Beach, where sprinkles of color littered the shores. We laughed together at all the losers grid-locked in traffic as we flew over it all. We flew past the famous Mission Beach Coaster, where people once rode for almost a week straight to try and win a car.
Read this entire feature FREE with photos at:
http://www.jetsettersmagazine.com/archive/jetezine/sports02/adventure/helicopters/sandiego/lajolla/helitour.html
By Josh Edelson, California Jetsetters Magazine Correspondent at www.jetsettersmagazine.com
About the Author
Josh Edelson, Jetsetters Magazine Correspondent. Join the Travel Writer Network in the logo at www.jetsettersmagazine.com