1045-1400
Airport: SFO
Location: Bayfront Park
Equipment: Nikon Action Zoom XL 10-22x50
Registrations collected: 81
For a total of: 127
Airlines: 26
I brought The Boy with me to SFO this time. He lived blocks from MDW growing up, but had never been to an airport to enjoy the experience. I was a bit worried he'd be bored, but was super happy to spend the morning with him, so off we went. After a bit of a parking adventure and begging our way into a hotel bathroom, we set up camp at Bayfront. It was busy. More traffic and bigger jets than last time I went. My binoculars were great - still not exactly adequate to get all of the numbers from the 28s, though. (Damn American and their silver fuselages!) But much, much better.
After what seemed like 20 minutes but was actually about 90, things calmed down a bit - all the heavies seemed to have departed and the 1s were slowing down. I decided to put down my binoculars as The Boy and I enjoyed yummy pasta salad and juice. I did decide to pick them up one more time for a Delta A330 since I didn't have an A330 in my collection yet. It was quite exciting until I got home and entered the tail number into the FAA registry and realized that I had written it wrong. I guess I'll just have to go back...
A man arrived with his camera and began to set up camp (I wonder if he knew he missed the most exciting stuff?). I wasn't in the mood for talking or sharing my spot. We thought about staying another half hour for the Emirates arrival from Dubai, but we were both cold and sunburned - not a great combination - so we started to pack up instead. "Just one more," I told The Boy as I noticed lights in the distance. Good thing - it turned out to be a KLM MD-11! At the time, I hadn't spotted yet a KLM or an MD-11, so I was thrilled to leave on such a high note.
Lowlight:
- Copying the registration of my first A330 incorrectly.
Highlights:
- A delicious picnic lunch and lovely company.
- A Cathay Pacific 744 touching down just past four jumbo jets gathered at the end of the 28s ready for takeoff. I'm including a (poor quality) picture (just because I caught it.) Someday I'll have a nice camera.
- A few 777s and the A330 taxiing parallel to the 1s about 1,000 feet away.
