Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Travelling Tales

When you live in Hawaii, it is difficult to go anywhere and enjoy life as much as you do at home. This is especially true when you travel for an entire month and miss, not only a beautiful wife and family, but also epic flying days like those described in recent posts on windlines.net.

I recently traveled to the Maldives for a week, and the Philippines for a week, both for conferences (aka - work!) On my last day in the Philippines I received an email from LeeAnn telling me that her brother was electrocuted in a logging accident in Oregon and that, although he survived, his co-worker was dead. Upon my return to Honolulu, on the next available flight, we booked tickets to Portland, Oregon, where he had been taken by life-flight to the burn center, to make sure he was okay.

Miraculously, he is doing very well. And although he has undergone three surgeries in 12 days to fix broken bones, charred flesh and blow-out wounds, he and his family are still coming to Hawaii in November. We talked often about paragliding and Chad, and his wife, want to experience the dream we live. We will be looking for two tandem pilots to take them for an instructional flight close to Thanksgiving! I would be remiss to not mention the fact that I took my wing to Oregon and flew twice. I know, I am addicted, just like all of you. Luckily, I have a wife who understands my problem and overlooks my weaknesses. I flew once on her parent's 3600-acre ranch, pioneering a launch from which I am sure no one has ever flown, and once at Tiger Mountain, near Seattle, Washington. Both were merely sled rides, but after three weeks without Skyalis, it was perfect.

I am thrilled to be home and cannot wait to get back in the air with all you Monkeys. Check out the video I posted of flying Tiger Mountain and meeting old friends, like Meredith Malocsay, from Rat Race. See you all this weekend and, in the meantime, please remember how fortunate we are for our families, opportunities and lives. None should be taken for granted.

3 comments:

Thom said...

I love that song, Our families' thoughts and prayers for a speedy strong recovery for LeeAnn's brother and we look forward to helping make their Hawaiian Vacation.
See You in the Air.

Duck said...

JD, LeeAnn,
Wow! Sorry to hear about LeeAnn's brothers injury, but glad that he seems to be recovering quickly! Congrats on pioneering a new launch and thanks for posting the pics and video! They are great! You really hit the nail on the head about how fortunate we are to have our families and live here and get to fly. I look forward to seeing you guys back in the air above Hawaii!

Anonymous said...

JD & Leeann,
best wishes for Chad's recovery.Hope to meet him . Got some good 'healing honey ' for both topical & interal use waiting for him . Aloha Mark aka thebeeman