From: Chris Claborne webmaster@cyberthought.com
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NOTE: You can click on the pictures in this story for a larger version. Enjoy.
7/8/01, C-182, N724RJ, MYF to Bend via Chico, 6.5 hrs VFR day. (Day 1)
Well it's the big day and Tony Texeira, Jim Newport (in a
182-RG, N133BW) and myself Chris Claborne (in a 182, N724RJ) are the total team for this
trip. There were a lot of cancellations but the hard core were
there. Chris is first on the scene loading up his aircraft, with Tony and
then Jim shortly after. Mike Gretton came by to send us off. He
worked real hard trying to finish a job up in time for the trip but it didn't
work out. The team is totally stoked and excitement is in the air.
I woke up at 3:00 AM thinking about the strange fuel flow problem in the 182 I am taking. I took it for a test flight yesterday and noticed that it didn't drink at all from the left tank. I will be turning the fuel selector to the left tank once I reach cruise altitude. If it won't drink from the left tank, it will be a very long day with more than the one planned fuel stop.
Jim had made custom hoods for Tony and I to put on our GPS units (Each of us has a Garmin 295) to shield against the sun. Very Cool! This should really help out since we will be flying pretty much all day. After we were through looking at Jim's handy work, Tony went back to his task of seeing how much food he could pack into the back seat. I'm not quite sure what Tony has planned for this trip, but he won't go hungry. Maybe he was thinking about cutting expenses by eating crackers and other goodies rather than spend his avgas money on restaurants.
The weather had been miserable for the last week due to a monsoonal flow from Mexico. Luck would have it that the forecasters are correct in that it would break down last night. The weather is severe clear. My flight briefing consisted of the briefer scratching his head trying to find something significant on the route of flight. This is of course a welcome event.
Once up in the air at about 5000 feet, I switched tanks to the left only to see if things would run OK. Not even a burp so this might be the solution. As I flew on the gauges confirmed that the bird was drinking from the left. When switching to "both" it seamed to only drink from the right. No problem though. I have a feeling that this is some sort of cross feed problem but I am not going to worry about it too much. It would make fuel management a little tougher but this won't be a problem since we really don't have any legs over about four hours and I have six sloshing around up there.
Both planes wisely used flight following through the LA area. I stayed with them a little longer since I didn't have anyone in the right seat to talk to. Our air to air frequency was open and we exchanged conversation along the way.
Jim (AKA "One One"), and Tony (AKA "Alpha Dog") gave me a
little more than a fifteen minute head start and I think I reached the runway
about three minutes ahead of them. I think all the food in the back was
slowing them down a little. I was very bummed to hear that the on field
Deli was closed Is it possible that Tony knew this and thus the reason for all
the food? This scheme is starting to come together. After getting
fueled up and windows washed we met a guy waiting out in front of the FBO for a
ride to the bay area. Aaron, a fellow airman, lived in the area and
offered to give us a ride into town for lunch. What a guy. We took
him up on the offer and begged him to let us buy him lunch. Burger King
was our host and I think I will stop right there.
After lunch we were off. Our planned rendezvous is Crater Lake. One One and Alpha Dog gave me another ten minute head start. I picked upon radio contact on our air-to-air freq. I started asking Tony where Mt. Shasta was. It was roughly 90 nautical miles away and gee, I just couldn't find it out there. After a few times, of going my innocent routine a few times, Tony finally caught on that I really didn't miss the 14,000 foot mountain directly in front of me.
Wow, what a site. As we got closer and closer it just got more
magnificent. At this point I started snapping pictures of Shasta
about every 10 minutes. I also started fooling around with the camera
trying out self portraits. Since I didn't have anyone with me, I had to be
the cameraman too. Forcing the flash to fire was just the ticket to get a
self portrait in front of the mountain. Looking at the some of the other
pictures, I could see exactly what my airspeed was, course (from the DG and compass), altitude, VOR settings, etc. The next job was trying to get the
background the way I wanted. Because I can flip the video view finder
around on my camera, I can see what I am taking a picture of, kind of like
looking into a mirror.... OK, turn to the left. Raise the nose up a
little, level it out... OK, click, that's a wrap. At this point I am
totally stoked.
Because we weren't getting too much chop off the mountain I thought it was going to be a smooth ride all the way into bend. Interesting thing was that as soon as we passed Shasta, it started to get pretty choppy and at time rough depending on where we were. As we came into Kalamath Falls area, there was plenty of beautiful scenery. There was a fire burning just northeast of town and I saw one tanker working the area. It was pretty far from our course.
Crater lake was quite a site. I got a couple of nice pictures
but I wasn't prepared for the size of it and couldn't quite get the whole thing
in one photo. One One and Alpha Dog arrived at the lake at about 30
seconds behind me. It was a little frustrated with my inability to find
Tony and Jim since I wanted to get a picture of them with the lake as a
backdrop. Tony and Jim were above me and I was staying extra low.
After a pass around the lake, we headed for Bend.
As the day wore one, the thermal activity continued to grow. With the practically non-existent auto-pilot in the aircraft (Cessna wing leveler which I couldn't even set the lock on it due to electrical trim) I was having fun staying on course. As for altitude, I just kind of rode it out. I went from one up-draft to down draft and after a while it all equaled out. As I approached Bend, I had charts all over the place and was hunting on the floor for my flight guide. After picking that up along with the needed charts off the floor, I looked out the window and my stomach told me it was time to land. It was getting a little tiresome. I passed over the field behind 3BW to check the wind and then entered a left down wind. Just after I turned base getting close to final, a plane just on the radio that he was on short final, strait in. Hmm. His only comment after I told him my position was "I guess since I am in front I'll go first". I thought it was a little rude and I had to execute a go around which wasn't something that I wanted to do since I was a little tired of riding out the waves. I got a little gust of wind up the runway so it wasn't my best landing.
We were greeted by Mike Gretton's parents, Gill & Maryland Wilson,
and shortly there after
the fuel truck. The aircraft weren't quite as thirsty as they were at
Chico. Our plan was to Mike's parents out to dinner as a little thank
you. I was grateful that Tony had decided to leave the food he brought in
the airplane. So rather than being forced to eat Tony's travel food (and
there was enough for all of us), and bivwack under the wing of the plane for the
night we were headed to a hotel and then a good Mexican dinner.
Dinner was very good. Gill, Mike's dad was very interested in flying. He had served in the Marine Corps. during WWII as a radio radar gunner, sitting behind the pilot in a dive bomber. He had quite a few tails about his flying days bombing and then evading others as they tried to shoot him out of the sky. This brave man flew 45 missions. I was appreciative that he was in the mood to talk about it. "Semper Fi" Gill.
After returning to our hotel, we took a walk to try to walk off some of the food. We all over ate. I had to quit early I was in so much pain. That evening we met in Tony's room to do some planning for the next day. We had already had a full evening of planning at Tony's house the week before. Our GPS units were cocked and ready. We exchanged some tips with each other on little features and nuances of the Garmin GPS units. If the weather was good, and it was forecast to be better than today, we would amend our flight plan and fly by Mt. St. Hellens after crossing the Columbia.
7/9/01, C-182, N724RJ, Bend to Arlington via Mt. St.
Hellens, 2.6 hrs VFR day. (Day 2)
This morning we were picked up by Gill and his wife and headed
to breakfast. After last night I wasn't that hungry and I was pretty
excited to be heading for Mt. St. Hellens. This would truly be a highlight
of my trip since this was the landmark that I was most looking forward to.
We said goodbye to our wonderful hosts and excitedly headed for the air. Once up, we headed north. Again Tony and Jim gave me about a 5 to ten minute head start. As we crossed over the river, Alpha Dog and One One were about three minutes behind me. Mt. St. Hellens was in full view now and I was preparing my camera and busy looking for traffic. This was a popular destination and I expected to see a few planes going around. Tony's last visit to the Mountain was just after it blew it's stack so there was a practical bee hive of activity. Fortunately for us, we were the only ones there. I arrived about a minute ahead of the other aircraft. WOW!
I took my time examining the whole area. I had seen a documentary
on the eruption of the volcano so it was fun to compare what I had seen in the
older photo's taken for the documentary and what it looks like today.
Spirit lake still has a lot of logs in it but nothing like the massively packed
mud pit it had been. Tony and Jim joined me about two minutes after my
arrival and we started looking for them. This time they decided to stay
lower and I pulled up a little over 500 feet above them. We looked for
each other for a while but to no avail. Finally I spotted them below me
and shouted "Tally Ho! I have you!" on the radio. I asked One
One to pull a little power so I could catch up to them and shoot some pictures with
the mountain. Because I was buy myself I kept a good distance between
us. It also helped that it wasn't too bumpy around the mountain. It
was still way before noon so we enjoyed a relatively stable ride.
Once I got some good pictures of N133BW going around the mountain (good considering my distance), I asked them to take I picture of me. I was then informed that they had left their cameras in the baggage compartment.
I am once again called on to do a self portrait to document the
mission. This was going to be a little more difficult than
yesterday. After taking a look at the view finder and one test shot, I
realized that I needed to recline my seat a little and play with the position of
the camera. The final shot, click on the the picture at right, required me
to finish by rolling the aircraft to the left a little to position the mountain
in the window while I was looking at the view finder. Not a bad effort if
I do say so myself. As we left the area, I couldn't help taking one more
picture (posted on the web site), it was so awesome.
On our final leg to Arlington the air was still pretty smooth, the visibility a million and not a cloud in the sky (well a few high ones but who's counting). About five minutes after leaving Mt. St. Hellens a twin passed about 500 feet below me. Kind of made me go pop-eye for a minute. After making a small change to the route in the GPS it locked up on me. I then needed to reboot the unit for my final approach through the Seattle class B airspace. It would be very helpful to avoid penetrating the class B without permission. After the reboot the GPS thought I was on my way back to San Diego. I was using a route that had the entire trip programmed into it, including the return legs, and because I was very close to the planned return route, it did exactly what it was programmed to do. Luckily I had programmed a single route from Bend to Arlington which made it so I could avoid using the direct for each of the flights.
As I was rebooting the GPS, flying the aircraft, looking for traffic and starting my decent I was a little worried that I hadn't set a backup OBS for the beginning of the Class B. Since I wasn't sure, I turned away from it till the GPS came back up to verify my position. I had already started working on the VORs as a backup. Everything worked out fine and I ducked under the Class B. I had to continue a strong decent to miss the next level in the cake. I wish I had more time to site see over Seattle. I didn't do much because I was to continually scanning for traffic.
The touchdown at Arlington was a greaser (made up for the crappy
landing in Bend yesterday) and uneventful. The next task was to figure out
where to park. The ground crew was just getting organized but they were prepared.
A guy on a scooter was giving parking directions to Tony and Jim and they gave
me a holler to let me know what side of the field to head for. Once
parked, a high five was in order and the obligatory picture of the successful
pilots.
We had the proud distinction of being the first two airplanes on the show
grounds parking for attendees. I felt that we should have received some
sort of award for it. Look for the picture at the end with a after and compare
to the "before" to the right..
That afternoon we took a quick trip into town so I could get a $12 device that would allow me to download the days pictures. I was dying to see my creations. The drive down was fun. There was constant ribbing of the pilot in command, me, turning, dodging, getting disoriented (we pilots never say "lost"). Since none of us had brought a GPS, we were starting to wonder if we were ever going to find the store.
We found the store after constant commands from Tony, and Jim who were scanning the charts and my directions. At first they didn't have the part I wanted, then they did... part purchased. Our next stop was to the Star Bucks for a coffee. There was more stories and hanger flying. Then it was time to give Jim a hard time as he was PIC on the way pack.
That evening we found a local Italian restaurant and got fed and watered. The food was average. We then retired to the motel where I downloaded the pictures. For one thing, I wanted to make room for more picture taking for the days ahead. Although I could see the pictures on the camera, it wasn't nearly as good as looking at them on a fifteen inch screen. As you can see (from the article), the pictures aren't for Life magazine but adequately documented the trip. I stayed up late preparing the pictures for the web and a quick put up to the Tony Tex Web site so I could share with a few friends. I then busied myself reading e-mail.
7/10/01, Earth (Day 3)
We woke early to the buzzing of little ultra light airplanes. After a leisurely
breakfast we headed over to the show to check out what was going
on. There were a few more vendors setup. I bought a chair and table,
the chair for the air show. There was a Rans aircraft rep there with
their wares (one of them pictured at right). Everyone is gearing up for
the new rules on "sport aviation" rating and class of aircraft.
They will most likely be a little heaver than the current ultra light
category. The one at the right had the performance of a Cessna 172 for two
people. The max airspeed and cruising airspeed were a little too close together
for my liking.
I couldn't resist taking a look at a new Moony aircraft at the show. I don't ever even remember sitting in one. Although I hear they are a little cramped, I wasn't quite prepared to be always be rubbing shoulders with the guy next to me the. The salesman was waiting for a friend to come pick him up so he spent quit a bit of time working with me. It was a little out of my price range but it was fun to get the full treatment. It pretty much had everything, full avionics panel, speed brakes (it was fun to watch them deploy), engine, etc. I was a little disappointed in the visibility out the front. The space between the dashboard and the ceiling left little viewing room. I guess there is a price for speed but after paying all that money for a first class airplane, I would think you would want a better view. After all, that's one of the reasons we fly. I thought it was a little funny that the sales man locked up, and then walked over to a Cessna 172 to go home. What a anti-climax it was for him that day.
At noon we headed over to Tony's cousins house for conversation and dinner. They have a very nice home with two girls in Seattle right next to Crest airport. Chris is a fireman and had the day off. He had a beautiful Kit Fox in the garage (why I don't have a picture I don't know). He was as much a die hard pilot as we are. We went up to the airport and looked around. He then took us over to to a friend of his that has a Russian Yak in his garage out back... Oh yes, and the driveway to it goes directly to the runway at Crest. Gotta love it!
Margaret made an excellent dinner, serving surf and turf (Steak and Alaskan King Crab). WOW. You just couldn't top this day I don't think.
7/11/01, Earth (Day 4)
This morning we decided that the Irish place next door would be good for breakfast since Denny's would surely get old in a hurry. It was day one for the air show and we were pumped. More hanger flying of course and I started to probe a lot more about instrument flying with Jim and Tony. I think it was that morning that I decided that I would start my training when I returned. Nothing earth shattering but a crest in that thought process.
Tony had just finished telling us a story about how he had a piston decide to exit the aircraft one night and made a successful landing at a airport afterward. We talked a little more about different things and then Tony knocked on the table twice and stated "well, I've never had a emergency at night". Jim and I just stared at Tony for a minute until it hit him. We all laughed about what Tony called his "senior moment". We ribbed him about it for the rest of the trip.
I checked out just about every kit on the field. There were quite a few
manufactures reps on the field. One of the ones that I was very enamored
with was the Velocity. It was fairly fast, easy to get into, and had some
very beefy landing gear. I liked the way the builder put halogen
lights on the gear it self. It did a fly by that day and looked very fast
with the gear tucked up.
One of my other favorites was also there, the Lance IVP, a pressurized lance air with a turbo charged IO-550. It was a fast machine and designed to climb to 24,000 and go close to 300 kts. The climb to high altitude was necessary since it needed to get to cool air as soon as possible. Because it was pressurized, it got very hot in side. For one, it didn't have a lot of vents to the out-side because it needed to stay air tight, and second, the pressurization unit pumped in very warm air.
The air show was a lot of fun. I quickly lost Tony and Jim as I ran all over the place taking in the sites. We met Chris, Tony's cousin, and had lunch together and then inquired about fuel.
After lunch it was then about time for
the air show. It was missing some of the big names but was a hell of a lot
of fun. Our aircraft was parked on the front row so we took up residence under
the wing. It was so relaxing some of us caught a cat nap toward the end of
the show.
That evening we had dinner in town at a place called the Bistro. What caught my eye was their salmon dish. We were a little taken back when we walked in. It was very up scale place and a seamed a little out of place set in with everything else. The dinner was fantastic. Tony and I enjoyed a bottle of fine Merlot from the Columbia valley and we all did the usual hanger flying.
7/12/01, Earth (Day 5)
Day two of the air show was here and for some reason I was just as pumped to get
going. My first objective of the day was to spend a little time cruising around the ultra light section. They owned the south end of the field and
had a runway all to them selves. This was a huge field and the area was
about a mile from the main runway. I was listening to a pilot on my hand
held radio talking to the tower, "Arlington Tower, there are is a large
cluster of small planes just south of the airport". The tower called
back with a little contempt in his voice, "Yeah, it is several ultra
lights. They're kind of doing their own thing down
there".
For some reason I took particular interest in the gyro
copters. There were some practicing touch and goes while I was
there. I walked over to the booth that one guy had and took a look.
He was explaining the various construction, how it flew, did a little hanger
flying and then explained that he was the only pilot that had decided to loop
and roll one of these things. He is OKed to do acrobatics at shows by the
FAA with a pretty high hard deck. If you ask me, I think he is a little
nuts.
I then headed through the parking area, looking for Bonanza's for sale and to a beautifully restored Boing 247. It used to belong to United airlines. There were giving rides and it took me about a second to make up my mind, I was going dude. I had always wanted to ride in a radial engine aircraft to see what it was like, how it sounded and rode. I wanted to see how people in my parents day traveled.
While waiting for the ride I realized I was in perfect position to see all the arriving aircraft coming to the show. Some were attendees like me and others were flying more exhibit like aircraft. There was everything from Cessnas to just about every kit that I have ever seen (and some I hadn't) to war birds. It was fun the past few days watching proud owners taxi by, driving their members up the ramp and showing them off a little. There are lots of pictures that I took at the Tony Tex Web site.
The time finally arrived, it was time for my ride. The ribs of the wings
went through the isle so it was a little interesting walking up the isle.
The attendants didn't use carts in that air plane for sure. Firing
up the engines was fun but I was expecting a little more rumble from those beautiful
engines. We rumbled down the taxiway and took off.
This was also to be the first tail wheeled aircraft ride as well. I was looking forward to the take off since it would be done a little different. After you get rolling down the runway with the engines roaring, then the pilot lifts the tail off the ground as you roll a bit further and then you are off. Once we were up, the pilot pulled the power back to preserve the engines since parts were a little hard to get. They purred right along with a little ticking sound from somewhere as the prop did it's work. Almost like a quiet tractor engine humming away.
We left pretty late. As we were getting ready to leave, a pilot in a ultra light that was sort of a powered parachute had crashed. A air ambulance took the poor guy out. From what I heard, his chute didn't quite fully deploy on take off (bad judgment) and then he had an engine failure about 50 feet up. I think because the chute wasn't fully deployed, he hit a little hard. A bit of a downer.
Our final night in town we had Mexican. It was good. I think we were all a little tired. We retired to my room where we did some alternate planning for the trip home. The forecast was for coastal clouds which wouldn't make for a pretty trip down the coast so Tony had a great idea to fly down to Portland and then down the Columbia.
7/13/01, C-182, N724RJ, Arlington to Bend via Columbia River, 2.5 hrs VFR day. (Day 6)
We visit Denny's one last time. I am itching to get going because I need to do the whole trip in one day. There was a scheduling fowelup and I had to take a different airplane but with the promise that I get it back in time for the next pilot to take it to the east coast. I've called him but he isn't willing to delay his departure (and I don't blame him).
A quick look out the window tells us what we need to know for the time being, it's overcast like it's been for the past several days. We are hoping for an early burn off.
We head down to the airport to load the planes up and then Tony returns the car to the on-field spot. The FAA had setup a outpost on field to handle weather briefing, flight plan following and other support activities. This was a great service. Tony, Jim and I went in and got a first class briefing on the weather. They had three computers hooked up to the net with two screens each so they had a very large desktop to do the many different tasks. Our briefing was so good, the boss was getting a little irritated at how long it was taking. The overcast was forecast to burn off a little later today but we might be able to go north where it burns off a little earlier and get on top. The airport just went VFR so we had that option. The weather was clearing toward our route of flight as well, we just needed to get out of the Seattle area.
Tony had a coffee while I had a double shot latté. We were all itching to get in the air so we headed down to the planes. The first order of business was to move a little cub out of the way so that I could get my plane out. One thing for sure, the cub weighed a lot less than the 182. The wheels had sunk a little into the turf and it was an effort. The three of us plus a few CAP cadets pushed me up on the taxi area so we wouldn't blow away the campers when we departed. Tony and Jim's plane was next. Then we were off. The taxi was long and slow over the turf (I didn't want a prop strike). There was no departure procedure so I asked but didn't get much of a response from the tower. They just wanted me out of there area if I was going to go. Traffic was pretty light on the inbound side so I was a little less worried about looking for those guys.
I took off behind what looked like a cub but was actually a home built. I stayed high and figured I would pass him. Ha! No was I was going to zoom right by him. Tony and Jim were right behind me and were headed up the route in front. We were in constant contact. The weather was about 1500 AGL and about 3 with some light chop. In some places you could see that it was paper thin with some small holes. We low leveled it on the way out, but legal. I had my hands full flying, tracking my course on the GPS, and memorizing the charts for terrain. I didn't like the fact that the terrain would be rising in a while. I knew exactly where Tony and Jim where because we were both flying the exact same course. The bonus for me was that they were keeping me up to speed on what the conditions were. As we moved along I kept taking notes on airports for alternates in case I wanted to return and wait another hour or so.
Tony hadn't been in the area for about two years but he said he remembered a pass that we could run through just south. Sure enough, there it was. I'll never question Tony's memory again. As we continued south, the weather reports from Jim and Tony were becoming a little less relevant. I am starting to wonder how much longer I was going to hang in there. Tony and Jim turned south west to avoid some high terrain coming up. I didn't make exactly where they did this so reports were just a little less relevant. It was about this time that a large hole opened. I punched up top and breathed a little easier. I gave Tony a Jim a yell regarding my success and shortly there after they were on top as well. The overcast cleared about twenty miles south of us.
The reason that you haven't seen any
pictures so far is... well there wasn't much to see beyond 3 miles. Once
on top though, we get another real nice view of Hellens. We were headed toward Portland. Because the weather was bad
on the coast and therefore there wouldn't be much to look at so we decided to go
up to the Columbia river and fly up that to the Dalls. According to Tony,
it was going to be a pretty flight. After that point we would fly south to
Bend and they would check for weather. If it was good, Tony and Jim would
head for the coast and fuel up there. If it wasn't so nice we would meet
in Bend, fuel up and continue South. Once on top the latte was starting to
work it's magic. I was relaxed and starting to dread drinking the stimulant. I am now a big supporter of the in-flight relief bags.
As we continued south we
descended to stay
under the Portland class C space and got ready to shoot up the
Columbia. It was a beautiful sight. I had driven up it a ways
from Portland on a business trip about two years ago so I knew in general where
I was. I kicked myself and almost turned back because I flew right past
some very large and well known falls of my right without even looking. My
attention was a forward though where it should have been.
Next was a very cool view of the dam and then up the river some more was an airport practically on a sand bar. The wind was kicking up and at times I was showing a ground speed of 160 KTS! It was a pretty smooth ride but I knew once we started to climb back up to head to Bend it was going to get a little rough.
We didn't make it all the way to the Dalls. Just before that point, the scenery turned kind of barren and uninteresting so we turned south early. There was a fire in the area so at times we have visibility under two miles. We both dropped down a little to get below the dense haze. It cleared up about 15 miles north of Bend.
7/13/01, C-182, N724RJ, Bend to Fresno via Chico, 4.9 hrs VFR day. (Day 6)
Bend was going to be a quick stop for me since the clock was ticking. I already had the San Diego terminal forecast on my mind thinking about the coastal fog that was forecast to move in at 2200. We fueled up, snacked on some crackers and health bars that Tony and Jim brought (notice how I'm no longer ribbing Tony and Jim about all the food) and hit the sky. I got about a ten minute head start on Tony and Jim and headed toward Chico. My plan was to fuel at Merced and then head into San Diego. It was still quite choppy but mostly clear skies (only a few puffs around). It was a pretty trip back down. Mt. Shasta was again majestic, and the air a little rough (I had to snap another picture).
I listened to the in-dash CD player along the way to break up the monotony. It's funny how Tony and Jim just don't appreciate good singing.
As we approached Chico, Tony and Jim were working with flight watch trying to figure out if they could make a coastal stop for the night. They found a possible location and headed west to South County Airport (Q99) SE of San Jose when they reached Chico. As we broke into the valley the air turned glass smooth. This was a welcome experience. It was kind of like being on a dirt road for about 300 miles and then coming up on smooth pavement. I saw Alpha Dog and One One in front of me for a while, about 50 miles north of Chico but they are too far from me as I came up on Chico. It was after 1800 now so things were cooling off. I headed for Merced and said my goodbyes.
As I entered the Merced downwind on the 45 I asked the pilot in-front of me if he thought the FBO was open or if they had self serve gas there. He said they were probably closed and had no self server... Hmmm. I broke off my approach and was thinking of his suggestion to head west for about 25 miles to another airport that he knew had self server. I was bummed. I didn't plan on getting here so late. I could make it to San Diego on what I had but I didn't think it was a good idea to arrive with a small reserve in case I had to do some major diverting due to weather. I continued to fly south not wanting to give up time and head west. I a few small airports along the way hoping that someone would answer. Fresno airport was coming up but I didn't want to be held up buy all the traffic that a Class C airport could dish out. I gave up though and called approach just as I was getting to the area. I was planning on flying buy so I was above their class C. I descended and extended the down wind a little to bleed off altitude. As it turned out, the place was a ghost town. There wasn't a sole in the air around there.
The tower folks were quite nice. I had a taxi map from my Flight Guide but after looking at the construction in the area, I asked for a progressive so I wouldn't make a fool out of myself and taxi into some drying cement. The folks at the FBO where I parked went right to work washing the wind shield and fueling me up. I snaked on a oatmeal bar and called Flight Service for the weather and to extend the flight plan that I filed in Arlington by an hour. The marine layer was still forecast to stay away till 2200 and I prayed that this was the case as I wouldn't be able to get off the ground till 2000.
7/13/01, C-182, N724RJ,
Fresno to MYF via Pamona & TANNR, 2.0 hrs VFR night. (Day 6)
I'm in the air again. The old six cylinder working away, beating it's way home. I remembered something that Jim Newport said about getting off course and using the direct button to quickly get to the next waypoint. His philosophy was to re-acquire the original flight path planed and fly that. The reasoning is that you planned for that route, and flew it in your head, and are familiar with it. I figured this was a excellent plan because the planned route had me going over the exact route that we took on the way up almost a week ago. I remember what the terrain looked like and what to look for as far as points of reference.
My next job was to rig myself for night flying and study the chart for
terrain and keep very close track of where I was. It's been a while since
I have done any nigh flying by myself and I am looking forward to it with nervous
anticipation. I took my headset mounted light out and turned the batteries
around (I store it with one battery backwards so it won't accidentally come on
in my bag and be dead when I want to use it) as well as a backup light which I
hung around my neck. With the sun low, the visibility was crappy. Night
fell shortly there and it was a little spooky. The moon wasn't out but the
visibility was great. I could see the outline of the San Gabriels with the
LA basin behind them which made me feel a little more at ease.
I had flight following since Fresno so I wouldn't have to break my personal policy of never flying through LA without a minimum of flight following services. They had me drop down to 7500 for traffic since I would be crossing the departure path for some big birds from Ontario and the inbounds to LA. It was pretty easy to see the stuff that he pointed out since they all had their headlights on. I could see the marine layer moving in west of Chino.
I was a little relieved to hear ASOS at Montgomery reporting clear skies but I wasn't out of the woods yet since those things can be wrong and the weather changes fast at this time. The marine layer was already over Escondido and I was hurrying in as fast as I could and still be nice to the engine. I heard another pilot say that Gilespee was still open so that was good too. Because I was getting low on the approach and approaching the airport from the side, I didn't see the lights till I was almost up on them. I hooked it around and made a pretty good landing. I was tired. It was 2200 and I called FSS to close my flight plan (quite proud of my exact planning).
After I got the aircraft fueled up and parked, the marine layer had moved in. The next job was coming down from my high, unloading and heading home to my own bed.
It was a fun flight. I learned a lot, accomplished the longest cross country of my flying life and had a great time. I was thinking about Oshkosh on the way home and my next flight in about two week to Springerville, Arizona. Funny thing was, I was taking the same airplane to Springerville and would be departing right after the guy that is taking it tomorrow returns it to it kennel.
