Nor Cal, Here My Ears Come!

Thursday was a great day at "work." I woke up early and found that I had a scratchy throat. I didn't realize how sick I was until a few hours later when I was trying to adjust my ears to the pressure changes inside the airplane. Since I have small Eustachian tubes anyway (that will be a fun Google search for you!), any sort of infection in my head makes it impossible to clear my ears when descending from altitude. It means there is a ton of pressure pushing on my ears from the outside with no way to relieve the pain. It rarely feels good, and it is a wonderful reminder to try to stay healthy! As a side note, I have been in bed since Thursday night when I got home to try to beat this, since we are heading out again tonight.

We visited all sorts of beautiful places that I had never seen before. Chico, California is north of Sacramento by seventy miles and is nestled in a beautiful green valley. We were greeted by Mack the Hangar Dog. I don't like dog hair, but this guy kept sitting on my feet for attention and was simply adorable! I wanted to steal him when we left, but I was too afraid someone would notice. We then went to McClellan Airport on the north side of Sacramento. Again, I had never been here before and enjoyed the stay. We were there long enough to try for Johnny Carino's for lunch. When we saw the traffic (typical California), we decided to stay close to the airport by eating at Golden Corral. Thank goodness we did, because Big Boss came back early to leave for our next destination.

I have a dear friend, Shari (hi Shari!), who lives in Tahoe all summer. Now I know why. Our last stop of the day before heading home was South Lake Tahoe Airport. What a breath-taking sight! I couldn't get enough of the mountains, pine trees, crisp air...I could go on and on! It was simply gorgeous, and it was hard to leave. The guys at Mountain West Aviation were exceedingly polite, and you just don't find that kind of customer service any more. My passengers returned by 6:15 PM, and we were on our way back to Phoenix. Not bad for a day's "work!"

Phoenix - Chico - McClellan - Tahoe - Phoenix