Takeoff: 4:22pm Landing: 5:37pm Today`s Airtime

Friday, January 30, 2009
252ndCobra flight, 261stPIC, 2 landings
Sunset Flight to Rick’s Airstrip
Rick called me on Thursday to invite me to fly out
to his ranch Friday afternoon and spend the night.
Sounded like great fun, but my trike was
unflyable, with the instrument panel laying on the
seat of my trike. I removed it two weeks ago to
cut a hole to mount a transponder. While I was at
it, I redid all my wiring.
I spent most of Friday putting everything back
together. It took longer than I planned, but I
finally rolled my trike out around 3:30pm. The sun
kept getting lower in the sky as burned more time
getting my radio working. Paul was in the pattern,
getting in some landing practice after being way
for a couple weeks I used him for my radio check.
I took off, did one touch and go and headed out.
There was no time to waste. I checked my GPS
and saw that I would reach Rick’s place after
sunset.
Upper right: Takeoff from Belen. I finally got
the over the shoulder mount for my Aiptek video
done right, although I didn’t take the time to level
the camera.
Lower left: Heading west. The sun was low in the
sky and in my eyes for the entire flight.
Takeoff: 4:22pm
Landing: 5:37pm
Today’s Airtime: 1.2
Total PIC Time : 639.1 Total Logged Time 660.3
The conditions were great today. I wished I
had gotten off the ground an hour earlier, as I
planned. But on the other hand, I was grateful
that I took off at all. The pools were directly
on my course line so flew by and took another
look and them and the travertine formations
upstream.
I crossed the Sierra Lucero (in the background
lower left) and continued further west. The
sun was blinding, so I flew with one eye shut
and the other behind the control bar. I tried
to raise Rick on the radio, but no luck. I
suspected my push-to-talk button flaked out
shortly after leaving the pattern in Belen.
The sun touched the horizon as I over flew Rick’s
“Elk Valley” airstrip. Rick radioed me, but I couldn’t
transmit. No matter, since I was the only one in the
pattern.
The conditions were perfect, no wind and calm. I
saw Rick below, standing next to his trike. I looped
around to the left and setup for an uphill landing. I
made an easy smooth landing and the soft soil gently
slowed my trike. I barely stepped on the brakes.
Lower left: Rick walks up to my parked trike and
welcomes me to his ranch.
I secured my trike and we rode up in the truck to Rick and Denise’s trailer on top of the hill. After dinner I
took a short walk outside to look at the stars. I made the excuse that I wanted to check on my trike, but I
really just wanted to take an night hike under those stars in the still night air. I borrowed a flashlight and
radio and hiked down the hill towards the runway. I turned my trike uphill and into the faint trace of wind,
but I doubt my trike would have budged an inch that night.
On the way back, the flashlight started to fade. I turned it off and walked back by the light of the
crescent moon. When I reached the trees, I used the flashlight in short bursts, and soon saw the faint
glow from the trailer at the top of the hill. Denise later told me mountain lions and wolvers have been seen
nearby. I glad she told me afterwards, else I would have heard them for sure on my walk.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Takeoff
Landing
rd
nd
253 Cobra flight, 262 PIC 4 landings
Rick’s Airstrip: 9:14am Springerville: 11:16am 2.0hrs
Sawtooth Mountains, Pie Town, Springerville,
Springerville: 12:30pm Show Low:
1:17pm 0.9hrs
Show Low, St. Johns, Cerro Alto, Cebolita Mesa
Show Low:
11:23om St. Johns:
2:06pm 0.7hrs
St. Johns:
3:01pm Belen:
5:26pm 2.4hrs
It was gonna be cold this morning so we slept in a
Today’s Airtime: 6.1hrs
little to let the temps come up a bit. Our plans
Total PIC Time : 645.2 Total Logged Time 666.4
were to follow US 60 into Arizona, and return on a
parallel path to the north through St John’s, AZ.
Left: Me, setting up my trike;
Right: My takeoff from Rick’s airstrip (Aiptek video).
We flew past Rick’s neighbor, who also has a
landing strip. The far end is wide and clear
of trees. When Rick returned later in the
day from our long flight into Arizona, it was
blowing hard cross at his airstrip and the
rotor off the trees was bad. Rick diverted
and landed here where it was less turbulent.
We headed south to the Sawtooth
Mountains. I saw these jagged peaks last
September and wanted to take another close
look at them.
On the other side of the Sawtooths we flew
over to US 60 and followed it west. “Pie Town,
NM” was just a few miles down the road (left).
We left the road and shifted over a couple
miles to the south to fly over the grasslands.
We saw on very large herd of pronghorn out
here. Sorry, no picture.
Every few miles we would fly over an old
homestead, abandoned years ago.
We landed at Springerville, Arizona. The novelty of
our trikes brought everyone out for a closer look.
A pickup truck pulled up with James and Micky
Tieman. Micky said she was a trike instructor 10
years ago, and James flew a Quicksilver at
Springerville till they forced him off the airport a
couple years ago.
Rick and I topped off our tanks with 100LL and took
off further west for Show Low, Arizona.
There was a lot of volcanoes and a lot of
snow.
I noticed it was getting late was a little
concerned about getting back to Belen
before dark. To save time, we didn’t walk
into the FBO at Show Low. We just taxied
back around and took off again.
Lower right: On final on Runway 21 at
Show Low.
We picked up a 5-10mph tailwind on our
leg to St Johns. I pulled in for some
extra speed.
Shortly after landing, a pickup truck
pulled up. It was Derek Davis, a trike
pilot I met almost three years ago at
the 16 hour Sport Pilot Repairman class
I organized in Albuquerque. He had
seen us fly overhead, and drove over to
see who were. We borrowed the
courtesy car for a trip into town to get
some premium car gas for Rick’s trike.
We has burned an hour in St Johns, and it
was going to be a close thing for me to get
back to Belen by sunset.
I had loaded some waypoints into my GPS for
some interesting volcanoes I had noticed on
previous trips to the Malpais. You can see
them as small bumps on the horizon to the
right. 11,300ft Mt Taylor, which normally
dominates the landscape around Albuquerque
was below the horizon. I had a long way to
fly back home.
I wished I had more time, because I would
have liked to slow down and at cruise 20ft
AGL all the way up the long 60 mile valley
that took us the volcanoes (right).
After an hour of flying, we finally
reached the edge of the volcano field.
There were a lot of them, and the
terrain was a lot less hostile that I
expected. Lots of grassy meadows at
the base of the volcanoes that allowed
for a safe close inspection.
Cerro Alto
Cerro Pomo
Cerro Pomo was a large asymmetric
cinder cone. Cerro Alto was tallest
cone out here. Snow capped Mt Taylor
is visible on the horizon between Alto
and Pomo.
Lower left: A closer look at
Cerro Pomo.
Top left: Approaching Cerro Alto.
Lower left, right: I looked down into the
summit cone of Cerro Alto, thinking that
this would be the perfect hideout for some
bandits 100 years ago. You could build a
fire in here, and no one could see it. The
trees at the center were very tall. I
wonder if there is any gold hidden in there.
We left the cones and crossed the plains
south of the Malpais. Cebolita Volcano is
the bump at the center of the picture on
the left. The faint shape of Ladron Peak is
to its right. It was a little disconcerting to
see Ladron Peak so far away, especially
when I knew that Belen Airport was
another 30 miles beyond Ladron. I kept
my speed up and slowly climbed. As I gain
altitude, my ground speed picked up. Soon
I was maintaining 80mph.
I would make Belen before sunset now.
I looked down in the lava field of the
Malpais. There were large circular
bubbles in the lava. More bandit
hideouts.
Right: Approaching the Sierra Lucero ridgeline
at over 80mph. That’s Ladron Peak in the
background. I did not want to get kicked by the
rotor so I continued about 5 miles past the
ridgeline before started my slow descent. When
I dropped down to the grasslands, it was dead
calm and smooth. I followed my shadow all the
way back to Belen.
In the pattern at Belen. I landed about 15
minutes before sunset, 45 minutes to
spare.
This had was a long fun trip. I logged 432 miles on GPS this weekend, 78 on Friday and a long 354 mile
flight on Saturday. Here is my GPS track.
Mt Taylor
New
A
M
co
exi
Malpais
na
rizo
Cebolita
Peak
Pools
Belen
Cerro Alto
Cerro Pomo
St. Johns
LO
N
G
V
A
E
LL
Rick’s Airstrip
Y
Sawtooth
Mountains
Pie Town
Show Low
Springerville
Ladron
Peak