On Saturday, 10 August, at the end of the morning, 14 enthusiasts gathered at Schiphol for the flight to San Francisco. From there, after another short flight to Vancouver, we would arrive at the starting location of the tour. The intention was to meet the last two participants there at the end of the day. Due to a considerable delay at Schiphol and a flight from South Korea that had landed just before us at SFO, we saw the valuable time disappear like snow in the sun at US Customs. In the end, it resulted in missing the connecting flight and with the remaining flights to Vancouver full, Air Canada decided that we had to go to Denver for our overnight stay. It was now after midnight local time when we landed. It was decided not to use the overnight stays, but to sleep at the airport since the flight to Vancouver would leave about 6 hours later.
Not only the group was stranded. One of the two participants who flew to Canada from Germany also did not make it to Vancouver on Saturday. Early in the morning (Sunday 11 August) we finally arrived at Vancouver, where we were welcomed by the last passenger, who had already travelled to Vancouver on Friday. We got into the country quite quickly, but it was a bit of a hassle at the car rental. Around lunchtime we finally set course for Abbotsford, where the last day of the air show had already started. The drive there went smoothly and entering the airport was also no problem. However, the Canadian demos of the CT-156 Harvard II, the CH-149 Cormorant and the CC-130J had already taken place. The first two decided to fly home immediately after the demonstration and therefore did not see our cameras. But, we were happy that after a long journey we could finally hear the sound of jet fighters. The demonstration of a Colorado F-16, Alaska F-22 (+ Heritage flight), CC-177, the CF-18 (+ Heritage Flight) made up for a lot. The closing of the show were the Snowbirds who showed us the most beautiful manoeuvres against a beautiful background. It was decided not to continue the journey that same evening towards the USA. A quick round of questions for the different crews of the static learned us that the airport would be emptied the next day between 9 and 12.
