Flying in a helicopter has been on Dian Cartwright’s bucket list for a couple years.
Thursday, the 87-year-old Warsaw woman - who had never flown in a helicopter before in her life - got to cross it off her list when she took a flight with Brian “Flyin’ Brian” Walsh at the Warsaw Municipal Airport.
“It was 10 times better than I could have ever dreamt. And I got to see things from a different perspective, should I say. I loved it. I was leery about it after I got it, but now I’m glad I did it,” Cartwright said after the ride.
Walsh flew her over the street where her children grew up. She said she saw The Magic Meadows from a different angle.
Asked if she’d go up in a helicopter again, Cartwright said with a smile, “I’d wait a while.”
The helicopter ride became possible after Cartwright bid on it at The Magical Meadows Rise Up fundraiser April 27 and no one else did. The bid started at $100, but Cartwright said $1,000.
“I would have gone $2,000,” Cartwright said.
Daughter Amy Goon said, “My parents have always been huge supporters of Magical Meadows, and she passed that on since my dad passed away (in 2023). And I have to tone her in from giving them all her money.”
Pastor Carl Adams, who sits on The Magical Meadows Board, was to ride on the helicopter with Cartwright, but they ended up going separately. He had never been up in a helicopter before either, though he’s flown in an airplane.
Cartwright said she was very supportive of The Magical Meadows because, “When you see a special needs child get up on a horse, and what it does for them, it’s incredible. It really is.”
She does not ride horses herself. Goon said her mom rode a horse at The Meadows and did well, but she didn’t like feeding the horse after she got off it.

    Dian Cartwright (L) prepares for her first-ever flight in a helicopter Thursday with Brian “Flyin’ Brian” Walsh at the Warsaw Municipal Airport. Photo by David Slone, Times-Union
  

“I don’t think I stayed on it long enough to ride it,” Cartwright said.
Cartwright was a little leery about the flight beforehand Thursday.
“It’s something I want to do, but do I? What if I fall out?” Cartwright said.
Riding in a helicopter got on her bucket list after she and her husband got Covid.
“He got it really bad and they flew him to Fort Wayne in a helicopter, but the guy brought the helicopter around so I could wave and say goodbye. And he just looked so happy, and I wanted to ride a helicopter after that,” Cartwright said. “Now I’m going to do it. Maybe. I haven’t gotten in it yet.”
Goon said after the flight, they were going to go to her house and have morel mushrooms. Cartwright said eating those mushrooms was “better than eating steak.”
Goon said they were going to have steak, too.
Walsh said a lot of people he’s taken up like to fly over their houses and take pictures.
“We’ve had people in the past that are on boats and jet skis and tubes and things, then they will text and say, ‘OK, we’re overhead,’ and then they take off and we chase them with the helicopter and they get video. It’s pretty popular around here. We do a lot of those in the summertime,” he said.
Cartwright wanted to fly by her house on Center Lake and over The Magical Meadows. Goon said The Magical Meadows would be outside as they had a class there Thursday.
Walsh said he usually flies 1,800 feet high at 80 mph, which is good for video and pictures.
“With a helicopter, it’s more like floating on a magic carpet,” he told Cartwright. “You’ll experience something that you have never experienced before. It’s pretty nice.”