Just Can't Get Enough Pancakes

I guess my pancake run back in June was a big hit with one of my friends. As soon as I told him about the trip, he reserved 7TY for the July fly in. I have been busy at work (I know, I sound like a broken record) trying to get a project out of the door that I have been working on since I started this new job. I still don't have it ready but it better be ready soon as I have to have it to a customer in about 2 weeks. Despite my job addiction, I managed to find time to go with Darren to get some pancakes.

We left very early on Saturday morning (we had the plane from 7 AM to 12:30 PM) and flew the same course we flew when I went. At least I know I can do a proper flight plan. This time, it was someone else flying and it was much hotter. The one nice advantage for taking 7TY was the GNS 330 Mode S transponder that shows traffic on the GPS. As we got near Midway (KJWY), we saw some traffic that was getting close to us. I just kept my eyes open and soon we saw the traffic. This is such a great feature.

I won't tell any details but I got to see Darren sweat a little on the landing at Granbury (KGDJ). Of course when we got to the food, it was as good as ever. Not quite as busy as the last one but still a good crowd. I called my friend Kyle who lives in Granbury and told him I was there and he hurried right over. I had called him the day before and he didn't answer but I left a message. He gets so many calls that it is easy to get lost in the noise for Kyle. I bought us all a nice pancake breakfast then we had to leave again. We said our goodbyes, pushed the airplane out of the ditch and headed back to Mesquite (KHQZ) for some more inexpensive fuel.

As we got to Mesquite, we heard our friend Anton rolling down the runway for takeoff. After pleasantries were exchanged, we entered the pattern we got in line for a busy series of landings. We fueled up and headed back home to McKinney (KTKI) for a landing at a hot airport. The controllers at McKinney are being very friendly these days. When we were on the ground ready to taxi to parking, the welcomed us home. Nice touch.

Once again, no loggable hours but a full belly and a lot of fun.

Flying High and Fast

This post is a little late but it's better late than never. On July 19th we had to take my daughter to spend a week with my mother. Unfortunately, my mother is a 6 hour drive, one way, away. With the hectic schedule I keep, this wasn't an option. So I asked Richard if he would be willing to fly us to Louisiana for the day in his Bonanza. He said that he could arrange that. I also asked him what it was going to cost me. His original response was fuel and $25 per hour for the airplane, which I thought was fair.

His Bonanza cruises at 170 knots and burns 13 gallons per hour at altitude. Our flight plan was a direct route from Addison (KADS) to Leesville (L39) and should have taken us about 1.5 hours. That was about how long it took. We went up to 9500 feet where it was about 55 degrees. As great as that sounds, the sun was beating down on us pretty hard so that offset any of the pleasantly cool air. We had given Anna a Dramamine table to make sure that she didn't have any problems. I've noticed that it tends to make her sleepy.

We finally started making our descent once we were handed off to Fort Polk Approach. Leesville is a tiny little paved strip 3807 X 75 feet. The Bonanza had no problems getting down and off at the only exit (midfield) they had.

We visited for a while and made the stupid decision to fly back at 3 PM in the middle of July. Too bad we weren't smart enough to wait until 5 or 6 PM when the turbulence would have been significantly less. When we left, there were some storms building behind us so I guess we got out in time but it was a rough climb out. We climbed up to 10,500 feet and headed for Mesquite (KHQZ). Mesquite has fuel available for a LOT less than Addison ($4.75/gal as opposed to $7.39/gal). We took on 48 gallons which averaged out to about 14 gal/hr. Not too bad for a "family" outing. I looked at flying into Alexandria, which is on the other side of when my mother lives, and the cost for a commercial ticket was $514 per person. I think we made the right choice.

No logged time for this trip, just riding in the right seat and taking a lot of mental notes about what it takes to fly a high performance complex aircraft. Below are the shots from Flightaware.com of our trip. Since we had flight following, there is a radar track and a log for both legs.

Better Sooner than Later

Pardon my bad puns (don't worry, there will be many more in the future). Last Thursday I went with my friend Darren to KOUN in Norman OK. this is the airport at the University of Oklahoma. we went down there for Darren's first $100 Hamburger run. Darren had the hamburger while I had Ozzie's special of the day, an open face roast beef sandwich with brown gravy and 3 sides. In hindsight, I should have tried the burger.

We left McKinney at about 9:30 AM and headed due North. One of our goals was to intercept the Victor 573 airway and fly to the Ardmore VORTAC then fly the Victor 17 airway to the WETIX fix and then begin our decent to KOUN. We got to the airport at around 11:15 AM. The line guys at the FBO were awesome. No tie down fees or minimum gas purchase, just great hospitality.

We finished lunch pretty quickly because there were storms building to the northeast and we wanted to get south of the Red River before they hit. Our path back was straight to Sherman (KSWI) where we could get some cheap fuel. Cheap is a relative term in aviation fuel. Sherman was $4.75/gal for 100LL. When we left Sherman, it was pretty hot so our calculated density altitude was 3376 feet MSL, the actual elevation at Sherman is 745 feet MSL. It was hot, but not too humid, so the engine and wings thought that we were at 3376 feet. When you have two guys that are the size that Darren and I are, the 160 horsepower 172 had to do some work to get us flying.

We made our last leg to McKinney in no time at all. Once we did the post flight and headed out, we had just enough time to get ready to head out to Addison (KADS) for their Kaboom Town celebration. When I get some pictures from it, I'll get them posted. In the mean time, we have some pictures from last year on the TFC club site.

No logbook updates this time as all of the flying was done by someone else. Since I'm just a student pilot, none of the time is logable.