Pilot Pete
Borrowing from Sinatra, "Come Fly With Me" may well have been Pete's enduring theme song. Pete first started flying in the '60s, and the passion for soaring into the sky, flying free, alight to new destinations, was lifelong.
Pete's first plane was a Cessna, his last a Bonanza - but no matter what aircraft he flew, he enjoyed sharing the cockpit with friends and family. Taking off on a spontaneous trip to Napa or Sedona was a great delight, and even routine business trips took on a more exotic lustre when he could take wing himself.
Always one to contribute his talents, Pete was a member of the Civil Air Patrol and would frequently assist with search and rescue missions throughout California. (It's not clear if he ever found anyone, other than new friends - but that in itself he would have found worthwhile.)
As with many things in life, the journey is often more important than the destination - and so it was with Pete's delight in flying, aloft in the clouds, smiling all the way, if not to a bar in far Bombay, then to a sunny afternoon at the end of a distant runway.