oakland aviation museum

This is a quite rustic museum with old airplanes and info regarding the aircraft and role that Oakland airport played in the WWII. It is very interesting to those who have a genuine interest in old aircraft. Older children might be interested, but there is little to keep smaller children interested....more of an adult museum or a history buff.

For a small museum they have covered a lot of history. Expect to give yourself a good 3 hours to see everything inside, not to mention what is outside. Great place for any aviator that is also interested in history.

We were there Saturday Nov 22 2014.Tourist were coming in steady.I learnt a lot about Earheart,Dolittle and many other displays.You could sit and rest or keep moving.Any questions there were volunteers to answer them.Thank you.

Located near the car rental return at the Oakland airport, this is great way to blow an hour or more at the beginning or end of a trip. Highlights the history of the Oakland airport, plus a wide variety of exhibits with a military emphasis. Lots of model aircraft plus a reasonable number of real-live examples.

This is a small but well documented museum with friendly staff.The seaplane : the Solent Flying boat is impressing ,first time I could visit such an aircraft and figure out how was air travel in he late 40's from London to Johannesburg in 4.5 days ...At the entrance in a little kiosk you can listen to live air trafic control.Plenty of information about first female pilots,south pacific lines etc... I learned that the first Afro American female pilot had to go to France for training due to her gender and race...Located northeast of the runways ,you have to follow highway 61 to reach it.

I was impressed with the amount of background information on the pilots, especially the section on female pilots. The kids like the airplane simulation room. It is not a big museum but one can learn a great deal on aviation and American history on one visit. Check out the museum gift shop. It has a big selection of model airplanes. The t-shirts are pretty cool too!

Our 11 yr old granddaughter wasn't too enthusiastic about this "Museum" and at her age museum doesn't strike a good idea to visit. Surprise, she had a great time. Thanks to the docent and scavenger hunt for kids. Also being able to get into the cockpit of planes since she has read about Amelia Earhart. Her brother, 13, really enjoyed it as he has interest in becoming an aeronautical engineer. Grandpa was a great tour guide since he has an amazing knowledge about planes and history. Good day was had by all.

I mapped out the directions to the museum before coming and while I don't live in Oakland I've been in that area before, but I got confused and a bit lost trying to find the place. Give yourself some time as it's located near the airport on a side road and tricky to get to. Parking is free and relatively abundant. On Sundays they offer tours of the Solent Flying Boat, which as others have pointed out was in Raiders of the Lost Ark. You have to pay an additional fee to tour the boat but it's fascinating to see how people traveled 60 years ago. One thing the guide pointed out is that the boat was not pressurized, so it never flew above 10,000 feet, and it used to take five days to get from England down to South Africa. Sounds like an exotic time of travel. Getting from the passenger cabin to the cockpit was a bit of a acrobatic experience; be prepared to slide and climb and wiggle through a weird small space. I'm not really an aviation buff but enjoyed this museum. One of the other guests on the tour was retired Navy Aviation and he offered some interesting comments on the fighter craft outside. Sounded like he intends to volunteer, so you may also get the benefit of his experience during your visit. Definitely good for kids and families.

I was pleasantly surprised at the amount of aviation eye candy and how well everything is organized and maintained. There are different rooms honoring different pilots for their accomplishments, and one is just for honoring women like Amelia Earhart, who flew out of Oakland quite often. Lots of great history and some older planes stripped down so one can view the workings on the engines and weaponry. Fascinating stuff!

This is a small museum (which I knew). I found a groupon for this museum and decided to go. The replicas out front were an awesome place to let the kids play. My main issue with this museum was that there was so much wasted place in the back area. I did not enjoy seeing the kitchen area or stacked chairs. Also outside seemed cluttered and need of cleaning up. The plus of this was that the main desk attendant was very helpful and entertaining. I just wished we could have seen more of the inside of the planes. There were a lot of volunteers there, but no planes opened and neither were the indoor simulators.

Admittedly a small museum, but the staff is extremely friendly and knowledgeable. The displays are focused on parts of aviation history that are directly related to Oakland and its airport, including Amelia Earhart who departed from Oakland on her ill-fated final trip. The indoor airplanes are in excellent condition. The showpiece of the museum is the four-engine Solent Flying Boat which was used in "Raiders of the Lost Ark." This aircraft is open for tours when a volunteer is available, and one can even sit in the same seat that Harrison Ford sat in on film. The museum is a very nice little gem worth the time and the cost (all of which goes toward maintaining and refurbishing the aircraft.)

i think we chose the wrong weekend to come. None of the aircraft outside were open ( there's a open cockpit day on june 16th 2013 though) and we weren't too interested in seeing old one from outside. My nieces enjoyed playing in the 2 small replica's at the entrance. My main problem with the place was that it cost $10 per person.. and we were through in less than 30 minutes.. but then again.. i am not a big aviation enthusiast. The place is small.. nothing fancy.

This is a small aviation museum located near the Oakland airport. It has a lot to offer ranging from early 20th century aircraft to the modern. I especially liked the area about Transocean Airlines and its connection with the Oakland airport and other airlines around the world. This is a nice place for aviation enthusiast to spend an hour or two.

Not a big place but a good cross-section of aircraft from military to personal, early aviation to recent. My sons (teen/tween) got a real kick out of the Tomcat. They were opening up a plane for a tour so we got to go inside a midsized plane formerly used by a general. We were there on a weekday so there was hardly anyone there which made for good photo ops and we saw it all in about 90 minutes. Was worth the trip.

It is a small museum, but a lot of displays with interesting historical information and photos. There's even a child sized airplane replica of a fighter plane, and our 2 year oldgrandson was so tickled to be able to climb in it and "drive"