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Jerry's 65th Lesson: Eastward Ho!
I just got back from the lesson. I feel like a wrung-out sponge. Like I've been through a meat grinder. But I'm still going to write this journal while it's fresh in my mind. Today was the Big Cross Country. San Jose - Pine Mountain Lake ( in the Sierra foothills ) - Cameron Airpark - then back to SJC. It seemed like we'd been planning this X-country for ages; first the weather was foul, then I got sick. Last night, my "party-hearty" neighbors woke me up at 2:30 in the morning, with loud voices, banging on doors, and car doors slamming. Then things quieted down, but my mind started racing with "airplane stuff", and I couldn't get back to sleep until 4:30-ish. Took quite a chunk out of the night, and I wondered if I could do it. I jumped out of bed at 0730, ran and took a shower so I wouldn't stink up the plane, answered some email, and raced down to SJC. I forgot two important things: But I did remember to bring all the charts, the E6B, my nav logs and flight plan. Called 1-800-WX-BRIEF, got told "A beautiful clear day. Wind's variable, but if you absolutely have to have a number, call it One-three-zero-at-eight". I filed my flight plan, we went down to the plane. I picked up an egg salad sandwich and a power bar at the pilot shop. Wolfed down the sandwich, and pocketed the bar for later. We blasted off around 10:30, only a half hour behind schedule. And opened our flight plan in the air. The first leg, to Pine Mountain Lake, was the hardest one. We tracked the Modesto VOR and kept close watch on the navigation log. It seemed like every few seconds he was after me. "Where are we now?" "What's that town?" "What's our ground speed?" "What's our ETA?" "Are we on time?" "Don't forget to fly the plane!" "Jerry, your heading's way off!" Well, at least I mostly managed to hold my altitude to within +/- fifty feet. Only once in the whole trip did I get distracted to the point that I lost a couple hundred feet. He reminded me by grabbing the yoke and pulling it WAYYYY up. We arrived at Pine Mountain Lake in good time - except maybe five minutes I lost by getting off the radial and having to track back in, and another four minutes by muffing the first landing, and having to go round and do it again. Pine Mountain Lake is an extremely scenic spot - surrounded by foothills, with a small lake in front of the airport, and a river canyon behind it that you fly over on downwind. It was clearly a Long Way Down into that canyon! There were houses sprinkled around the runway - with attached hangars that looked like big garages. And airplanes! Big ones, little ones, taildraggers, low wings, high wings... We stopped at the airport office to refresh ourselves. The lounge was littered with airplane magazines; a friendly place. It was clear that these people were seriously into aviation. After a short walk around, we blasted off on our second leg, northwest to Cameron Airpark. We climbed to a sane and economical VFR cruising altitude of 4500' MSL. After bouncing over the foothills for ten minutes or so, we climbed to a more extravagant 6500. My CFI eschewed the navigation log for this leg, preferring a different instrument of torture: the "foggles". "OK, I want to you hold this VOR radial. Keep the airplane level with the turn coordinator, monitor the altitude and VSI, and listen to the engine pitch." This was my first time under the hood. I flew with the foggles on for 20 minutes. It was harder than just plain VFR flying, but it was actually easier than being constantly quizzed about the nav log. Just concentrate on the needles and keep the airplane straight. When he let me take them off, the Placerville airport was in sight. He complemented me on my hood work, stating that I'd have no problem if I decided to go for an Instrument. Then he took pity on me, and flew the rest of the leg to Cameron airpark. Where Pine Mountain Lake was the country, Cameron was more like suburbia. It was hard to find: the airstrip looked like just another street. There was a power gate near one end of the runway. On the other side of the power gate was a really wide street lined with houses. Houses with Really Big Garages. We popped across the street for a snack, I fished out my Power Bar. In the heat, the bar had softened inside its wrapper, and looked like I'd already eaten it. In my jeans, I had softened considerably as well :-). The trip back to the Bay Area was pure pilotage - just point the airplane at Mount Diablo, pass the Rancho Murieta nuclear cooling towers... We did ask Sacramento Approach for flight following. This was Way Cool. As we percolated on down the valley, we got handed from control to control, no fuss, no muss. A couple of times, I didn't even catch which control they were handing us off to, so after dialing in the radio: "Mumble Control, Cessna One-eight-eight-two-Victor is WITH YOU at...." All the way back down to SJC, where I landed the airplane, and we piled out. We both agreed that it had been a good, productive lesson. All 250 nautical miles of it. - Jerry "92.1 Hours" Kaidor |