Red Rocks and Blue Angels--A Very Colorful Day!

We had seen advertisements on television for an air show featuring the Blue Angels at China Lake Navy Base on the weekend. That's quite a drive from our camping spot in Tehachapi, California. But the air show was free, and Red Rock State Park is on the way. Between the Blue Angels and Red Rocks, suddenly our Saturday was planned with very colorful stops that we were excited about!

We pulled into the first parking area at Red Rock State Park, and were greeted by this vast wall of a majestic red canyon.

It's hard to describe just how vast that wall is when you only see it in a picture. So Mark stood in front so we could put some scale to that wall in comparison to his 6-foot frame. If you haven't spotted him yet in the picture above, Denisa zoomed in on him in the picture below. He's that tiny light-colored speck in front of the big red boulder at the bottom center of the first picture. Hopefully, now you can find him in the picture above and realize that is a big wall!

Some of the coloring and the eroding columns remind us of views we have seen at Bryce Canyon National Park.

Not surprisingly, Denisa is wandering around taking pictures of wildflowers. She loves the detail of these desert dandelions.

When you put a whole group of them in front of a vast red wall, she likes it even better.

When you put Mark, wearing a shirt that exactly matches the pale yellow flowers, in front of that wall you have the best picture of the state park!

We keep seeing Joshua Trees around the deserts of California. It seems they aren't limited to the Joshua Tree National Park that we visited last week.

There was a group of photographers gathered in our parking lot. They were here to take pictures of the wildflowers with their super zoom lenses and heavy cameras. Denisa took this sweet little blossom with our cell phone instead.

They also mentioned this plant that we had never seen--a wild rhubarb.

There are several sections of Red Rocks State Park, and we also visited this area adorned with brilliant yellow wildflowers.

A close-up of this canyon wall shows the geological detail that reminds us that we have wandered into another of His wonders.

Just a quarter-mile down the road we see that the rest of Red Rock State Park has suddenly lost is color.

So we head further down the road to our destination--the China Lake Air Base that is hosting the air show today. We were in a long line of cars making their way slowly to the parking area, when we realized that this was a huge event. We found a place for our chairs among the crowd and settled in for the three and a half hour show. This picture shows the tiny part of the crowd in our section of the air strip. Similar crowds were lining the rest of the half-mile runway.

The show started with tiny specks jumping out of a perfectly good helicopter. As they made their way towards the earth, we saw those tiny specks were the Black Dragon parachute team, that helped us track their descent with smoke.

Two of them unfurled a U.S. flag between them while the Star Spangled Banner played. Let the air show begin!

The first pilot on the agenda was Spencer Suderman, flying his bi-plane named "The Meteor." He is the record holder for the number of inverted flat spins he can do, and we got to witness all his tricks.

Spencer works for the Disney Corporation, but today he showed off with loop-de-loops all over the sky in front of us. The most amazing were the cork screws that he made as he plummeted from 24,000 feet in the air. If you look very closely at the bottom of the corkscrew cloud of smoke, you can see his biplane continuing to screw its way towards the ground.

We were also entertained by Dan Buchanan, a trick hang glider who proudly waves the American flag on his glider. He is being towed around the air space in front of us, tethered to a 2,500 feet tow line attached to a pickup running up and down the runway.

At the end of his flight, the announcer let the crowd know that Dan was a paraplegic, confined to a wheel chair when he isn't hanging onto a hang-glider. His quote was, "I have to fly--I can't walk."

When the air show started there were no clouds and not a breath of wind. With no shade on the air strip, it was a bit toasty. People were seeking out every speck of shade for some relief. In between action in the air, we found that airplane wings provide a welcome (even though narrow) strip of shade.

The best shaded areas were filled with more planes on display. These were available for the public to look at from a distance. They were guarded by military personnel carrying automatic weapons, that reminded anyone with a camera that they couldn't take close-ups.

Back to the air show, the announcer was introducing the next pilots entering the runway area. Flying the Super Green Hornets, this is the Vampire Squadron permanently stationed here at Chino Lake Base. They taxied slowly for the crowd, in front of the mountains that encircle the base.

Our best pictures of these Super Green Hornets were when they were on the ground.

That's because when they are streaking across the sky they are moving too fast to get a crisp picture. When they flew in front of the crowd at low altitude, the roar from their engines was awesome. The announcer described that roar as, "listen to the sound of freedom."

The wind picked up as the sky clouded over in the afternoon. We were now sweating less, but had to hang onto our hats. There were other airplanes that had their time in the sky in front of the crowd. These included historical aircraft that had been restored . . .

and aggressive acrobatic pilots doing stunning drops and flips choreographed to music.

But the reason that this crowd had endured the weather today, was to see the final show of the day--the Blue Angels!

The crowd was on their feet as the pilots came to attention in front of their planes.

We watched as the Commander entered into the cockpit.

Each pilot has an assigned crew member, whose job is to check over every aspect of the plane before it takes to the air today. This picture shows the pilot, Lt. Tyler Davies, and his crew leader making last-minute checks.

The planes have assigned numbers, and very specific roles during the air show. Planes #1-4 fly together in amazing synchronization. They even take off at the exact same time in this formation.

Jets #5 and #6 are also flying right in front of us, doing some spectacular maneuvers. One of their favorites seemed to be flying towards each other at top speed. Since they are both flying at 400 mph, that is a combined total of 800 mph that they are closing the gap.

So the fact that they can get so close, but always miss each other is amazing--but a little nerve-racking to watch.

Meanwhile, the other four have circled back into our sight line, now in a new formation. It looks like they are touching as they fly by at 400 mph.

Back to our two jet pilots, now they are playing chicken while flying upside down.

The man emceeing this part of the program is the 7th Blue Angel. He lets the crowd know that the Blue Angels were formed in 1946, making them the oldest performing military group. This is their 2nd appearance this year, and they will perform all over the country in 2017. We would encourage everyone to make their best effort to get to one of those performances.

Meanwhile the first four jets are back, doing synchronized loops upside down. They are flying so close together that its hard to see there are four planes in the picture instead of just two.

These are the same jets that land on aircraft carriers in the middle of the ocean. So they obviously have to be able to maneuver at speeds less than full throttle to land on a moving target like that. We got a slow motion demonstration with the two jets flying straight in front of us at lowest speed. It's hard to imagine 150 mph as a "lowest speed."

Just to change up things, our four pilots return with two flying upside down and the other two right side up.

We would never get tired of watching those four-plane formations, but now they're flying in a five-plane line.

We watched as the five of them fly straight up in the air, and then do a roll back to the earth--always perfectly aligned with each other.

By this time we're used to the announcer alerting us to watch to the right or left for the next approaching jets. So that's when the 6th jet approaches from the rear and buzzes over our heads at low altitude just to surprise the entire crowd. I bet that pilot was laughing inside his cockpit as a crowd of thousands all jumped at once.

The Blue Angels make their own version of fireworks. They flew straight up in the air close together, and then split in five different directions at the same time. It's hard to comprehend the precision and skill needed to do something that looks that cool!

Just as fast as they all split apart, they all met back right in front of the crowd. We're not sure how they could possibly miss each other coming to one spot from six different directions. We're also not sure how we were so lucky to catch all six planes in one camera frame.

We were sad to think that the end of the show might be near when they came back together in their signature delta formation with all six jets.

They flew straight up into the sky,

before they peeled off into a six-man firework display. The only point of imperfection we saw in the show today was when the sixth jet's smoke stream failed to fire.

We were so impressed with this display of aerial acrobatics that we couldn't stop smiling as we watched it. We would look at each other and shake our heads in disbelief of what we were seeing. We had watched the Blue Angels practice overhead while we were camping at their winter base in El Centro, California. But watching the entire show was even more jaw-dropping-fun. It made us proud to be Americans and to claim those pilots as our own.

As soon as the jets landed, the crowd of thousands recognized that the air show had come to an end. There was a mad rush to gather lawn chairs and try to find our cars hidden in that huge parking lot. There was a line of people stretching a half-mile in front and behind us as we joined the mass of people heading home.

We were also impressed with the military precision that managed to clear that parking lot in record time. They didn't let us decide which way to turn, but they kept traffic flowing at record speed. We were surprised at how fast we got out of the base and out of town. On our way home, we could reflect on another great colorful red-white-and-blue day in the lives of these two wanderers.