“The first long trip they took was in ’29. That was the one through Central America to Belize, in British Honduras. That covered 7,000 miles. But they didn’t stop long at Belize. They’d gone there for a reason. They headed their plane over the Yucatan peninsula, looking for Mayan ruins. You know, the Mayan Indians had a wonderful civilization all built up long before the white men came to Yucatan. They had a huge empire, and big cities with buildings as large as ours. Scientists are always digging around down there to uncover the ruins, so that they can find out about the Indians, and how they lived, and all that. But it’s hard to find the places where the Maya Indians had their cities. The jungle has grown up so thickly all about them that it takes days and months to get to them. And those that aren’t on rivers are almost impossible to get to. “So Lindy proved once more that the airplane was a help to science, and flew over the old Mayan hang-outs, looking for ruins. He skimmed his plane over the tops of the jungles, so low that it seemed he might almost reach out his hand and grab a branch of one of those giant trees that grow down there, and he flew slowly, too, so that the scientists that were with him could take pictures. “They found what they were after, three cities that hadn’t ever been discovered before. And it took only four days, where it might have taken a party on foot months to do the same thing. Anne Lindbergh helped pilot the plane, and take pictures, too. “There weren’t any more exciting flights that year, but early the next year, that is, in 1930, Lindy ordered a new plane. It was a Lockheed-Sirius, a monoplane with a Wasp motor. It had a flattish-looking nose, but it was graceful just the same. It had something new that Lindy had designed himself. That was two covers that could be slid over the cockpits, so that the pilots would be protected in bad weather. “Lindy and Anne had a use for the plane and the cockpit covers very soon. They flew across the country one day and broke the cross-country speed record that existed then. “Hardly anybody knew what they were up to, and there were just a few people at the Glendale airport, where they started from. It was a terrible day, cold and rainy, and the sun hadn’t come up yet to dry things out. But the Lindberghs didn’t care. They had on suits heated by electricity, because they knew that it was going to be even colder where they were going. “A basket of sandwiches, 400 gallons of gas, and they were ready. It was hard taking off, because the load was heavy, but Lindy got his flat-nosed Sirius into the air beautifully, and they disappeared from sight. Disappeared is the word, because for hours nobody saw them. They were looking for them, too, because you can bet on it that as soon as the Lindberghs took off, everybody knew about it. All over the west the cowboys and Indians were gaping up to see the blunt-nosed plane, but nobody saw it.