New Page 2

Russ started flying hang gliders in 1976 as the movement was just starting to make advancements toward powered hang gliding and then on to the ultralight movement of the 1980's.

Russ and Lou Ann met in 1983 while flying their ultralights at Costerisan Farm in Bakersfield California. Costerisan Farm hosted some of the largest ultralight meets ever held during the heydays of the ultralight movement. Russ and Lou Ann went on to start their own successful fire alarm business in the Los Angeles area and decided to sell everything in 1995 and started working toward the move to Florida.

In 1998 Russ and Lou Ann packed up and moved from Los Angeles, California to Auburndale Florida with the two dogs and the two airplanes. They had been in Central Florida off and on for the last year looking for a suitable piece of property to build their dream home. Russ had spent more than a year building and test flying his new experimental home-built amphibious airplane known as a SeaRey. They also owned a 1981 PA 28 Piper Warrior that Russ completely rebuilt.

As the home was being constructed on a beautiful piece of property in the corner of one of the prettiest lakes in Central Florida, Russ was already out flying his SeaRey around the countryside.

As the house was being completed they had a visit from the Florida Transportation Department.

The word was, they needed a permit in order to keep the SeaRey on their property. This was finally settled after a year and half of paper work for a new Private Seaplane Base being placed on the Orlando and Tampa area terminal chart with the FAA designation of (1Fl0) Garner’s Landing.

Russ and Lou had meet a few of the local SeaRey owners and decided since the construction of their new home was finally finished it was time to have all their new friends over for a party. The party has been going on for the past nine years! Every year around the start of the Florida flying season and coinciding with the opening week of the Sun N’ Fun fly-in held at Lakeland Lender Airport, here in Florida, Russ and Lou have hosted the Annual SeaRey Gathering.

By 2006 the Annual SeaRey Gathering was attracting these little amphibs from far and wide. In 2006 there were the most SeaRey ever in one place at the same time, over 27 plus a number of other amphibious aircraft were parked that day on Russ and Lou Ann’s lakeside property and close to 200 people KitPlane magazine, Seaplane Pilots Association and the local news paper were in attendance that day. Last year's 2009 gathering was the biggest ever with over 30 searey's and a helicopter attending.

Russ and Lou Ann took a break from the big job it had become to host one of these SeaRey gatherings when a friend hosted the 2007 SeaRey Gathering at their lakefront home in Central Florida.

2008 saw Russ and Lou back hosting the annual event. It went off as planned but bad weather kept some of the fliers home, but there still was a good turn out. The local paper, and the Seaplane Pilots Association turned out to record the event. More than 13 planes and 100 people braved the weather to make the event a lot of fun. The great food and door prizes kept everyone happy throughout the day long event.