Yesterday I flew a route that has been on my bucket list for a while now. Dallas Fort-Worth to Kona, Hawaii. American flies the route seasonally and it is the second longest route out of Kona (Japan Air flies to Tokyo). They rotate between their 77Ws and their 772s on this route so I chose the 77W because let’s be honest, the American liveries on 200 are pretty bad. I took a little longer of a routing that took me straight over Albuquerque, just North of Phoenix, directly above Los Angeles and then flew along the Hawaiian Islands down to the Big Island. My flight time was 8 hours 12 minutes which is pretty much average for this route. If you want a little more backstory read this
A little extra backstory
You may know by now because of all my posts with the Big Island, that I went their with my family in July. On our 3rd day their we went to Kua Bay which is just East of Kona and the airport. A fun surprise was seeing all of the planes approaching runway 17 just in front of us, we mainly saw smaller 717s and some props but then suddenly we saw a giant 77W approaching. I was confused and when I looked at my phone I was really surprised it came all the way from Dallas. It was cool to see and I think the route would be really fun to try in real life.
Leaving an overcast Dallas for a Blue Sky in Hawaii The Orange Mountains as we fly over Albuquerque The stunning San Gabriel Mountains just East of Los Angeles Crossing the Coast past the huge Los Angeles metropolis After 4 hours of nothing but water we fly over the island of Oahu and fly south toward the Big Island The other islands come into view as we start our descent Flying by the volcanoes of Molokai The beautiful approach from the East past the Pololū Valley. (Beautiful sunrise at the Pololū Valley by the way) The view from Kua Bay as we put the gear down 5 miles out Touchdown in the Big Island
As always please let me know your favorite photo and please leave comments!