That was definitely not the case Wednesday.

About 120 veterans clad in red shirts and caps packed the building as they prepared for the 26th voyage of the Brushy Creek Area Honor Flight.

“I wanted to go on it for a long time,” said Marine Corps veteran William Lowinski, of Fort Dodge. “It’s one experience you’re not going to get again.”

The flight takes the veterans to Washington, D.C., for a whirlwind tour of the nation’s war memorials and brings them back to Fort Dodge that same night.

- Messenger photo by Bill Shea
Josh Porter, left, the superintendent of the Fort Dodge Community School District, helps a veteran get checked in for the Brushy Creek Area Honor Flight Wednesday morning at the Fort Dodge Regional Airport terminal.

A stop at Arlington National Cemetery to see the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is always a highlight of each trip. Army veteran Len Holdorf, of Spirit Lake, said he was looking forward to seeing that, He described it as “so awe-inspiring.”

Holdorf and the other veterans were to see something new and different at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier immediately after the changing of the guard.

For the first time, representatives of the Brushy Creek Area Honor Flight were to place a wreath at the tomb. The wreath had been ordered in advance. Two of the original members of the local Honor Flight committee — Army veteran Charlie Walker, of Fort Dodge, and Navy veteran Russ Naden, of Webster City, — were to place the wreath in front of the tomb.

Navy veteran Everett Johnson, of Spirit Lake, said he has always been impressed by the changing of the guard ceremony. He had visited Washington, D.C., about 10 or 15 years ago.

“I will probably get more out of it this time because it will be the second time around,” he said.

- Messenger photo by Bill Shea
Army veterans Terry Heidebrink, left, and Len Holdorf, both of Spirit Lake, wait to board the Brushy Creek Area Honor Flight Wednesday morning at Fort Dodge Regional Airport.

Johnson was in the Navy from 1951 to 1955. He served aboard three different submarines. His job was to maintain the air conditioning, refrigeration and hydraulics systems.

Arthur Umbrell, of Laurens, who served in the Army from 1956 to 1957, has also been to Washington previously.

“I’ll see some new things that I haven’t seen,” he said.

Lowinski,who was a Marine military police officer, was making his first trip to the nation’s capital.

What did he want to see there?

Everett Johnson

“Everything, really,” was his reply.

He said he believes it would be more meaningful for him to see the war memorials in the company of his fellow veterans.

Veronica Maas, of Crystal Lake, was also making her first trip to Washington. She was an X-ray technician in the Army from 1973 to 1976 and served at several hospitals in the United States.

“I just thought it was an awesome opportunity,” she said of going on the Honor Flight.

She said she really wanted to see the nurses monument, located near the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

- Messenger photo by Bill Shea
A Sun Country Airlines 737 carrying the Brushy Creek Area Honor Flight to Washington, D.C. takes off from Fort Dodge Regional Airport Wednesday morning.

“I hope to get my picture taken by that,” she said.

Holdorf, who served in the Army’s 562nd Field Artillery, decided to go on the flight after hearing other veterans talk about it.

“They were all just blown away by what this is,” he said.

He said he had been to Washington previously, but it was so long ago that the National World War II Memorial had not yet been completed.

He said the Vietnam Veterans Memorial “saddens me.”

“We had all these people die for what?” he asked.

Before the sun rose, the veterans, volunteers, medical personnel and members of the Brushy Creek Area Honor Flight committee boarded a Sun Country Airlines 737. That jet took them to Dulles International Airport in the Virginia suburbs of Washington.

In Washington, the veterans were to see the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the Korean War Veterans Memorial, the World War II Memorial, Arlington National Cemetery, the United States Navy Memorial, the United States Marine Corps War Memorial and the Air Force Memorial.