{"id":65439,"date":"2026-05-05T20:16:29","date_gmt":"2026-05-06T00:16:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=65439"},"modified":"2026-05-05T20:16:34","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T00:16:34","slug":"87-polk-county-veterans-depart-lakeland-on-honor-flight-for-day-long-trip-to-washington-d-c","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2026\/05\/05\/87-polk-county-veterans-depart-lakeland-on-honor-flight-for-day-long-trip-to-washington-d-c\/","title":{"rendered":"87 Polk County veterans depart Lakeland on Honor Flight for day-long trip to Washington, D.C."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It\u2019s a trip of a lifetime for some of our military veterans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The backstory:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Veterans and their companions took off around 6:00 a.m. Tuesday morning for a full day of sightseeing at the nation\u2019s capital. It\u2019s the Polk County Veterans Council Flight to Honor Mission #11. Veterans participating in the mission fly for free and are accompanied by a guardian for the day. Once the 87 veterans land, it\u2019s a full day of seeing the memorials and monuments, changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and much more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These veterans were so excited at 4:30 a.m. to hop on board their flight and make a full day of memories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What they’re saying:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The camaraderie of all the vets here, that\u2019s what I\u2019m taking away from here,” said Ernie Belkham, a Vietnam veteran in the Marine Corps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

“Brother in arms its the connection relationship is there automatically,” said Vietnam veteran Stan Charett.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The last time I was in Washington was probably 10 years ago, and I’m looking forward to just seeing the monuments around the pool, and I am looking forward to the changing of the guard at the tomb of the unknown soldier. I’ve never seen that one before, so I am looking forward to that,” Belkham added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The flight comes back later Tuesday evening with a big homecoming celebration in Lakeland.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more information on Flight to Honor, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s a trip of a lifetime for some of our military veterans. The backstory: Veterans and their companions took off around 6:00 a.m. Tuesday morning for a full day of… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":65440,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"9","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNlwvMDVcL1NjcmVlbnNob3QtMjAyNi0wNS0wNVQyMDEzNTIuNzQyLndlYnA_Zml0PTg5MyUyQzM3NSZzc2w9MSIsInR4dCI6Ijg3IFBvbGsgQ291bnR5IHZldGVyYW5zIGRlcGFydCBMYWtlbGFuZCBvbiBIb25vciBGbGlnaHQgZm9yIGRheS1sb25nIHRyaXAgdG8gV2FzaGluZ3RvbiwgRC5DLiIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiZG9pcyIsImZvbnQiOiIiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.RYi1kIGnxGVJISKKq6f8I3d4Aw-wWsxcl9QCP_yHNbYMQ"},"version":2,"media_source":"sig","attached_media":[{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/jetpack.com\/redirect\/?source=sigenerate&query=t%3DeyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvbGFrZWxhbmRnYXpldHRlLmluZm9cL25ld3NcL3dwLWNvbnRlbnRcL3VwbG9hZHNcLzIwMjZcLzA1XC9TY3JlZW5zaG90LTIwMjYtMDUtMDVUMjAxMzUyLjc0Mi53ZWJwIiwidHh0IjoiODcgUG9sayBDb3VudHkgdmV0ZXJhbnMgZGVwYXJ0IExha2VsYW5kIG9uIEhvbm9yIEZsaWdodCBmb3IgZGF5LWxvbmcgdHJpcCB0byBXYXNoaW5ndG9uLCBELkMuIiwidGVtcGxhdGUiOiJkb2lzIiwiZm9udCI6IiIsImJsb2dfaWQiOjE2MzA0MDY2MX0.omKrYftgDivmZmL5BrzWIIIgIeWTnCKRlXXYPu2cAZcMQ","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[9],"tags":[14551,14552],"class_list":["post-65439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","tag-87-polk-county-veterans-depart-lakeland-on-honor-flight-for-day-long-trip-to-washington","tag-d-c"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65439"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65439\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65442,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65439\/revisions\/65442"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}