Empty Nest Adventures
Life after the kids are grown
Making Cousin Amelia Proud
My great-grandmother was an Ehrhart. She would refer to Amelia as “Cousin Amelia”, although they had never met. Their last names were spelled differently, Amelia’s being Earhart, but she is my 10th cousin and I think she would be really proud of what happened this past week.
I was invited to take part in the worldwide event, Women of Aviation Week, or WOAW. Its goal is to expose women and girls to aviation careers. Currently, women represent just over 6% of pilots worldwide, a huge disparity.
Pilots, both men and women, donate their time, aircraft, and gas to give free flights all week long to women and girls of all ages. Unfortunately, last Monday (the day I was to volunteer) was extremely windy in Northern Colorado and the event was canceled for the day. Luckily, the rest of the week was gorgeous and today I was able to take the flight.
I’ve been flying many times in my life but today was the first time I was the pilot. It was exhilarating, a bit scary and I was sweating a lot. My friend, Kathi was in the back and I felt a lot of pressure not to kill her. The real pilot, Luke, was fantastic and gave me a mini lesson as we flew around looking at the Rocky Mountains, the Budweiser brewery and Colorado State University. Luke took over for the textbook landing.
I’d like to give a very sincere thank you to all of the people who helped make this event such a huge success. What a wonderful gift you have given so many of us. I think Cousin Amelia would be very proud!
https://www.womenofaviationweek.org/
Cover photo: Wikimedia Commons
What an accomplishment! You can check this off from your bucket list. 🙂
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Yes, indeed! Thank you. 🙂
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Cool history. Good for you on sitting in as Pilot. That is an accomplishment for sure.
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Thank you! It was a fun experience. 😊
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Thank you so much for inviting me and not killing me🤣 What a great day to be a pilot and a passenger!
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You’re welcome! So glad we could share that experience.
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Congrats , what an experience indeed^^, you are so blessed^^
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Thank you! A lot of amazing people made it all happen and I feel so fortunate to have been a part of it. 💗
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What an amazing honour and WOW!! What a breathtaking view
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Thank you so much! Yes, the views were pretty amazing. It’s fun to see your hometown from that vantage point. 😁
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That’s so cool!!
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You go girl! Looks awesome!
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Thanks! Yeah, it was pretty rad. 😁
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Views were amazing!
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That must have been so exciting! It was a great cause. Congratulations!
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It was! A little nerve wracking too. 😁 Thank you!
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Wow Julie!! This is amazing! And I love that they are looking to expose women to aviation. That disparity between men and women pilots is large. Our oldest son went on a discovery flight here locally. He did everything except land the plane and loved it. Our other two teens have shown no interest, but we would definitely support their passion if they did. However, my only daughter (the youngest) is interested in Engineering, and I already know she is interested in not letting her gender stop her from anything…so we’ll see what the future holds!
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Very cool! It’s so exciting to see what your kids’ interests are as they become adults. Being supportive of passions is so important! It’s kind of funny because just today we learned that our youngest is changing majors from engineering to music. Quite a difference! And we’re open to the possibility that it could change again. Haha
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Wow this is just so amazing! I’ve always dreamed of flying an aircraft but it seems impossible to achieve. Congratulations!😊
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Thank you so much! They have these events all over the world each year, so maybe you will be able to do it! I hope so. 🙂
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That’s good to know! I really hope I’ll get the chance someday.🙂
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Me too! You can look at http://www.womenofaviationweek.org to find locations near you. 😁
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Thank you so much! I’ve never heard of this before. I’ll definitely check it out.😊
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Wow, what a wonderful experience. Your Cousin Amelia would be very proud indeed.
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Thank you, Peggy!
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What an honor to be related to Amelia Earhart! Thanks so much for sharing this!
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It’s a very distant relation, but I think it’s pretty cool. Thanks for reading, David!
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