Best Adventure Thrills in 2024, Including U-2 and Supersonic F-16 Flights

It's the time of year for lists: tallest, fastest, best dressed, hotels with the best restaurants, the lake with the most alligators. You see the picture.

At the end of each year, I make my own list of the best adventures I've been on over the previous 12 months. This time, many of them are from events that the US Air Force allowed me to attend and write about. So here it is, in no particular order, with links to each story at the end of it.

Edge of space in a U-2: After seven years of planning, last summer I finally got to take a ride in the back seat of a U-2 spy plane departing from Beale AFB, California, where the historic plane is stored and still is used.

The flight was fascinating because above 70,000 feet you can see the blackness of space, the curvature of the Earth and landmarks on the ground for hundreds of miles around.

Amusing? Not really. My heavy yellow spacesuit, which protected me from the near-vacuum at the edge of space, was claustrophobic, cumbersome and uncomfortable. No matter what unique experience only a select handful of civilians have ever had. Thank you, USAF. The long wait was worth it.

Solar eclipse from 30,000 feet: Last April, I was invited to Sheppard AFB in Texas to witness a total solar eclipse from a T-38 fighter jet at 30,000 feet. Although from this perspective we had a guarantee that the event would not be obscured by cloud cover, it seemed like a unique thing to do. Plus, I had never seen a total eclipse, even from the ground.

It was pretty incredible. From the cockpit of my plane, looking up, I watched the darkened face of the sun for a good four minutes. Almost as interesting was the long shadow cast by the eclipse on Earth.

Supersonic in an F-16 fighter: To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the F-16, I rode in the back of an F-16 this month from Eglin AFB in Florida. As part of a training exercise, my pilot, Colonel Alec “Bulldog” Spencer, took the plane to Mach 1.6, about 1,200 mph, to 40,000 feet and up to 200 feet at above the Gulf of Mexico. We pulled some serious G. I even took the stick for a while.

It was my seventh supersonic, but it was as exhilarating as my first, flying a MiG-25 Foxbat in 1999. I discovered during my visit to the base that the plane is as deadly as it is half a century ago, with all its software additions. Big reveal.

Refueling of F-16s in flight: During long combat missions, fighter jets and bombers often cannot land in enemy territory to take on fuel. This is therefore done in flight with the KC-135 and the KC-46. Last November, I was able to board a flight from McConnell AFB in Kansas, in the first.

Our mission was not combat related, but to refuel the Thunderbirds Air Show Team's F-16s as they returned to Nellis AFB from an event in Florida.

I was amazed by the skill of the pilots in keeping the two planes at exactly the same speed and altitude during the process, as well as that of the boom operator at the rear of the plane who directed the fuel assembly into the small F-16 intake area.

Lynyrd Skynyrd at 170 mph: It's not often you get to meet one of your idols, let alone take them for a spin at 170 mph in a stock car. Last March, yours truly was able to do both.

Artimus Pyle, the 76-year-old former Lynyrd Skynyrd drummer who survived multiple plane and motorcycle crashes, visited Daytona International Speedway for a thrill ride around the high-banked oval and 2 .5 miles long.

Pyle was cool as a cat with nine lives while I took him on a six-lap ride courtesy of NASCAR Racing Experience, or at least he seemed to be. Hell, if he survived all his bad accidents and such, I was pretty sure I couldn't kill him. After our ride, he took a car by himself – and, in true Artimus Pyle fashion, he survived too.

ForbesU-2: the tallest man in the world, for a few minutes anywayBy Jim ClashForbesThe total eclipse seen from fighter planes: it doesn't get any betterBy Jim ClashForbesF-16 release tests writer's mettle on supersonic training missionBy Jim ClashForbesKC-135 battles storms and icing to refuel F-16 Thunderbirds in flightBy Jim ClashForbesLynyrd Skynyrd's Artimus Pyle, a cool cat with 9 lives, rocks DaytonaBy Jim Clash