Flights
STL to DFW to KOA
Summer Vacation 2018 - Hawaii
(created Sun. July 29, 2018; updated Sun. Aug. 19, 2018)
The flights to the islands
Family Photos
Photos of Airplanes
Photos from Airplanes
I travelled for work for many years, too many years. The weekly to and from the airport lost its fun long ago, but the flights themselves remained fun - taking off, cruising, landing... and the views from up above it all.
Flying is even more enjoyable nowadays that I rarely fly for work, and am airborne only with Ann Marie, Matt & Abby. And planes are forever exciting.
We flew
Family Photo inside the iconic St. Louis International Airport’s Main Terminal.
“... Minoru Yamasaki (1912-1986) was responsible for its design. When completed, his building was hailed as a marvel. It was, indeed, the first airport building to make a formal statement about aviation and aerodynamics. ...
“In his splendid book Modern Architecture in St. Louis, historian Eric Mumford writes that the new terminal “was based on the idea of repetitive concrete-shell vaulted halls, each 120 feet square and 32 feet high…. The vaulted concrete roof over the check-in areas echoed the forms of the Roman Baths of Caracalla, itself the model for New York’s Pennsylvania Station and the main hall of the St. Louis Art Museum. This modern grandeur led Architectural Forum to call the terminal the ‘Grand Central of the Air’ and suggest it was a prototype for a new generation of air terminals.”
“Lambert’s airport siblings are buildings such as the TWA terminal at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York and the Dulles –Washington Airport terminal, both designed by Eero Saarinen, who left his indelible mark on St. Louis on the riverfront downtown.
“As much as any transportation building ever created, Yamasaki’s terminal for St. Louis sang lyrically of the grace and beauty of flight. He traced the trajectory of the miracle of the Wright Brothers’ first flight at Kitty Hawk in his building’s vaults. ...”
source: https://www.landmarks-stl.org/architecture/lambert_field/
In DFW, this is/was our 777 that flew us to Kona.
Our plane flew as a trio of 777s from Dallas to the islands...
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-the 777 that took off just before us flew to Honolulu
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-our 777 flew to Kona / the Big Island
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-and the 777 behind us flew to Maui
The flight from Dallas arrived a bit early and took just over seven hours.
“Back in the days of TWA,” the STL-Maui non-stop was 9-9.5.
We crossed from land to flying over the Pacific Ocean over Dana Point, which is in Orange County, south of Los Angeles and north of San Diego. The view from our port / “driver-side” windows was of San Diego and La Jolla.
The skies over the Pacific were cloudy most of the way, which surprised us a bit.
Mauna Kea - the tallest mountain in the world... it just happens to have most of its height under water.
Final Approach...
The airport in Kona, like much of the Big Island, is built atop a lava flow.
This image is a four-second time-lapsed image created during our landing using the Slow Shutter Cam app (as noted on SmartPhone Cameras).
The view after walking down the jetway, onto the tarmac, just before walking into the terminal.
Links to the rest of this travel journal:
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17)Oahu - Dole Plantation Maze and Polynesian Cultural Center
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26)SLUH in HI
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28)Postcards
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29)Reviews
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30)Hawaii 2000
