Dating : Fear and Loathing on the Way to Mexico

A true story . . .

. . . only the names have been changed to protect the idendity of the other two idiots.

Bob, Lester, and I were enjoying beers one night when Bob announced he’d just gotten his pilot’s license. So naturally we wanted to fly somewhere.

“How about Mexico?” Lester suggested.

“Tomorrow morning!” we all agreed.

We weren’t blowing smoke about that.

We rendezvoused the next morning at a tiny landing strip in Oregon.

Bob’s plane was a Piper Tri Pacer. Technically, a PA-22. A single engine prop plane.

It had been manufactured in 1953, the same year Sir Edmond Hillary was the first to ascend Mount Everest, Ian Fleming published his first James Bond novel, Playboy’s inaugural issue showed lots of Marilyn Monroe, and Westinghouse introduced the color teevee for $1250. (That 1976 $1250 would be $5670 in today’s dollars!)

The Piper was described as having a “classic fiber finish” In other words it was a cloth covered plane. Abbott’s Piper was nicely accented with duct tape, covering all the rips and tears in its classic fiber finish.

It looked pretty sad.

It was 23 years old.

And it had more hours on it than a Tijuana hooker.