John and I visited the new Dulles Airport displays fo the National Air and Space Museum today. After seeing the one on the Mall, this was the icing on the cake.

You get a very close look at many historically important aircraft like this WWII Corsair fighter which could fly over 400MPH in 1944 and amassed an 11 to 1 kill ration over enemy fighters.

And the actual Enola Gay - the airplane that dropped the atomic bomb over Hiroshima to help end the war. There has been some controversy about displaying this aircraft because while the Hiroshima mission did help end the war earlier, it also dealt such terrible death and destruction to Japanese civilians.

What I really enjoyed about this P-38 fighter-bomber is the they have left the actual WWII paint, with all of its battle scars, on the plane. Almost every other aircraft in the museum is restored to exacting standards, but that makes them look so new, even though they have all seen heavy use.

I took way too many pictures of neat airplanes to publish here, but how could I not include this one of John looking at the Blackbird, which was so super secret that it flew missions for over 10 years before the public or the press knew it even existed.

Tomorrow. we're heading back down the Potomac towards the Chesapeake Bay.