Ramona Cox, Internet Entrepreneur

beneath them. As she says: “I decided early in life
I wanted to explore every medium the Earth offers
– sky, land and water.” And so she does. Her
underwater films spool out a lifetime’s worth of
brilliant exploits in such exotic locales as
Thailand, Fiji, the Galapagos Islands and Costa
Rica (“oh, those hammerhead sharks!”). Yet in the
air she is hardly less intrepid. She has flown to
remote areas of Idaho to airplane camp – “it’s
wonderful! although I do like a good RitzCarlton.” Down the Caribbean chain to scubadive off the island of Bonaire, near Venezuela –
“You can’t believe how beautiful!” To far, far north
Alaska to see polar bear, and even all the way to
London via Canada, Iceland, Greenland and
Ireland. “Flying low-level over the glacier of
“I’d love to see
more women fly.”
For Ramona Cox, “flying is fun. Why be too serious?”
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W
Greenland cannot be described,” she says.
Having earned a treasured “wingman’s patch,”
Ramona even has flown a T-34 in formation with
other warbirds at Osh Kosh, an experience she
loved. “It’s challenging and really exciting,” she
says.
“In my family it never was a question of if but
when I was going to learn to fly,” reveals Ramona, who
always has had the confidence to go for the gold in all her
professional and sporting pursuits – gloriously. “My father
is my greatest inspiration because he instilled in me the
idea that it doesn’t matter what you want to do, you just
learn the techniques, understand the rules, and you just do
it,” she says of her guiding light, who earned his wings in
1937 and during the war, she is proud to say, took part in
hen Skychick flies in, the big, red lips
painted on the nose of her Cessna 206 are a
hint: here is one dynamo at the controls
whose many facets are as dazzling as a diamond’s – not the
least of which is her wit.
“For me, flying is fun,” she says. “Why be too serious?”
Pilot, skier, rock-climber, diver – Ramona Cox, 49, of
Redondo Beach, CA, aka “Skychick,” is an entrepreneur of
the sporting sort whose successful
Dressing for the unpredictable at Burning Man.
internet
retail
business
www.faucets4less offers her her every
heart’s desire, including a lifestyle of
outsize adventure and globetrotting
fun.
“I really, really enjoy adventure,”
says the five-foot, 98-pound idol to the
kids she has helped learn to fly,
fledgling future pilots who love, she
says, “seeing eye to eye with a big kid,
myself.” “I’m so lucky to have the
freedom and flexibility to live as I
choose.”
Roller-blader,
boogie-boarder,
belly-dancer,
formation
flyer.
Ramona’s endless sporting passions
have yet to find her on the seas – “I still
would like to learn to sail and navigate
the oceans,” she admits – but with the
expertly mastered hobby of underwater
videography, she is certainly home
AVIATOR
the civilian training program that gave WASPs their first
flying hours. Ramona’s half-brother, who knows his way
around a phantom jet, also encouraged her.
Far be it for the land, however, to escape Skychick’s
typically “very focused” attentions that carefully plan each
next move of her life. Intense focus and deliberate
planning, “that’s what I love about rock climbing and
other sports that don’t have a margin for error,” she says.
“You have to make a decision now and there’s no room for
panic.” On at least one occasion it has provided all the
spontaneity and surprise that Ramona also loves – to
make her life spicy.
Last year at Burning Man, the legendary Nevada desert
“experience” where 30,000 people annually gather in a
unique celebration of art, games, humanity and selfcontained survival, an adventure she loves for its
“absolute unpredictability,” Ramona saved a man’s life.
She had gotten word of a motorcyclist, lost in the remote
desert for hours, so she set-off on a personal search.
Flying low it was she who ultimately found the man near
death not far from his abandoned bike and her radio call
that brought rescue. “Out of everything I’ve ever done,
saving that man’s life is my greatest accomplishment,” she
says.
Still, for all her dizzying, dazzling achievement,
Ramona is forever met with “amazement,” “shock” and
“surprise” in the male-dominated world of aviation where
she obviously is so at home. “Whenever I say I fly the first
question is always, oh, are you a flight attendant?” she
laughs. “I’ve just gotten used to it.” She adds: “I’d love to
see more women fly for the sport is very natural for them.
It’s not about strength, but subtlety. Especially flying
formation, men will tend to try and yank and bank and
force the stick, but it’s subtlety, subtlety…” And a place
for no margin of error and no room to panic? Yes, a place
where women, “who have learned to accomplish things
through subtlety,” can excel. Just like Ramona.
And just as her father taught her back when she herself
was learning to fly and flawlessly would land her tiny
trainer behind arriving C-130s at Van
Nuys, “once you learn the rules,
practice, maybe overcome a fear, you
fly!” And if you’re Skychick, who gets
her most creative ideas for her online
business when she’s “up in the
tranquil air, free from the bonds far
below,” you touch down wherever you
go saying hello with the world’s most
winsome kiss, painted on the nose of
her Cessna.
Watch for those lips! When you
see them, say hello back to Ramona
Cox, for who knows what incredible
flying – or diving or rock-climbing or
skiing – adventure this extraordinary
dynamo just might invite you to join.
If ever you could be that fortunate.
Ramona Cox
Aviator, Adventurer
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“I’m so lucky to have
the freedom and flexibility
to live as I choose.”
The airplane camping is grand, and romantic, in remote Idaho.