Lost River Gorge & Boulder Caves

I took a day off so we could do the family thing before school starts.  Kevin suggested Lost River so that is where we headed.  It was a nice day for a drive. 
If you aren't able to go up and down lots of stairs Lost River may not be the place to explore. We had fun going into the maze of caves.  Some were very dark so   Kevin used a headlamp he uses for hunting.  We ate lunch at the picnic tables.  I saw a butterfly bush in a landscaped flower bed along the path.  I saw 4 or 5 hummingbirds flying around.  They seemed to be chasing each other.  I tried to get a picture of them but there were to many people walking by.
 

After lunch Kevin and Kate took off into the caves again.  We caught up with them about half way through.

Mid afternoon we headed to Franconia Notch.  Kate, Kevin and Pam hiked to the bottom of a bridge we went to.  Mt. Lafayette was in the background.  It is probably 100 feet to the bottom.

We headed back to Rt. 112 toward Loon Mountain and the Pemigewasset River so we could relax and play on the rocks.   The river rocks were all sizes with many being very round and smooth.  This is from the water rolling the rocks down stream during big storms. 

Three days after these pictures, hurricane Irene dumped 8 to 11 inches of rain in this part of NH.

With so much water from Irene the river has washed out several sections of Rt 112.  We crossed over the Loon Mountain International Bridge which you see in the background.  After Irene, the bridge was closed and a damaged section of the bridge has now collapsed.  One Loon report said the water crested at 23 feet.

Boston - Portsmouth Air Show

Pam, Kate, Kevin, and I decided to check out the air show in Portsmouth.   It wasn't a very good day for pictures as it was hazy and hot with an overcast sky.  We arrived just before noon.  This gave us time to walk around and check out some of the planes on the tarmac. 

U.S. Army Golden Knights were skydiving.  They were very good. 

One of them did  a controlled cutaway which are the two pictures you see here.

USN had an F/A - 18 Super Hornet at the show.  The pilot put it through it's paces.  It is a pretty threatening plane and was fun to watch.  Did I say it was loud ...

Team Heavy Metal flew some nice formations.  They had a Russian MiG flying around with this group also.

Jason Newburg flew the green biplane and Sean Tucker flew the red biplane.  We couldn't believe the things they had those planes were doing.  They were outstanding.

Team AeroShell had 4 red and silver planes.  They had excellent formations.  They were fun to photograph.

Michael Goulian normal stunt plane.  He did some amazing stunts for us.  There was also a US Navy Legacy flight featuring an old WW11 Corsair and the new F/A - 18.

I saw some real fancy cameras with huge lenses at the show.  I didn't see a lot of those guys trying to follow the planes flying around.  Most likely tough to do because of the weight and lens length.  

You need to go to an air show at least once.  We had a great time.