Breakfast Club
An Affiliate of the Arizona Pilots' Assn.
The
Knife & Fork
Breakfast Club Meets in Holbrook
14 Jun 2008
by Warren McIlvoy
The June Breakfast Club
event took us to the northeast part of Arizona to an old and familiar
place called Holbrook, Arizona.
Now, the thought of flying to Holbrook for breakfast may not
set your heart aflutter but, remember, it is not always the destination
but rather the journey. Holbrook
is a rather short trip and it is a very easy airport to get into and
you usually don't have
to fit into a lot of traffic in order to land there. As a matter of
fact, it is about as "laid back" as
any other place that you will visit. Within walking distance, you have
your choice of two
restaurants, Jerry's (adjacent
to a motel) and a stand alone Denny's,
take your pick.
Denny's is about a 3-block walk
with Jerry's about 2-blocks
further north from Denny's. This
time we choose Jerry's as we
have been to Denny's each time
that we have been here in the past. Other than the seating
arrangements, you could not tell which of the two choices that you
ended-up in. The food is about the same as are the prices. The bottom
line here is, except for the
additional exercise of walking the two additional blocks each way, you
might just as well save the
time a make Denny's your first
choice. The highway in front of both establishments is part of the
old, historic Route 66 often
called "America's
Highway".
Holbrook (pop 5150), like many
small, northern Arizona towns, owes its existence to the railroad
and Route 66 as well as to the
cattle ranches that dominated the territory in the early days. Some
of the historical events that characterize Holbrook are:
- During 1881 &
1882, railroad tracks were laid down and a railroad station was built.
The
community was then named Holbrook after the first engineer of the
Atlantic and Pacific
Railroad.
- Holbrook became the county seat of Navajo
County in 1895 and was incorporated in
1917.
- Many of the events that played out during the
Pleasant Valley War up to 1887 occurred in
and around Holbrook.
- A
meteorite with an estimated mass of 190 kg exploded over the town of
Holbrook on
July 19, 1912.
The one really unique thing about Holbrook, or more specifically, the
airport, is the refueling
routine. More often than not, the manager is away from the airport
attending to other duties. To
get fuel, you retrieve the key from along side the computer keyboard
and open the lockbox that
houses the power switch to the fuel pump. After refueling, lock the
lockbox and replace the key
by the keyboard. There is a phone message pad on the desk where you
list your name, the
amount of fuel that you loaded, and your phone number. Some time during
the next 24-48 hours,
you should receive a phone call from the manager to get your credit
card number. Where else
have you experienced this kind of trust? I spoke with the manager on
Monday to give him my
credit card number and I asked him if he had a situation where fuel was
taken but no contact
information was given. He replied that he had never had that happen. I
think that this speaks
volumes about the aviation community.
The Holbrook Gang
- Warren & Jeri-Ann McIlvoy in
93MB, BC-1 &1.5
- Asa & Cheryl Dean, BC-52
- Bob Jackson & Doug Boone in 6906D
- Larry & Sandra Jensen in 14LF,
BC-65
- Adam Rosenberg in 4372J
- Robert Caglia & 5-Guests
What's
Next?
The July Breakfast Club
event will have us traveling east to Globe
and the Apache Gold Casino
and in August, we will be heading south to Tucson, Ryan and Todd's Café. That all for now
but
remember, fly safe.
Click on the Holbrook
link to view some photos of this fly-in event.