Well folks,
"The ol' bloggy blog," as a friend of mine would call it, needed an overhaul, and here it is. I've been meaning to share some stories (and pictures) from the road that might actually interest the general public... And I'm gonna tell all my flying stories here too. :-)
So, with that in mind, I've deleted all of my old posts with the exception of the one below that still fits within the scope of my "new" blog, and I'll hopefully be writing more often with more interesting stuff. Enjoy!
Sunday, October 17, 2004
Saturday, October 09, 2004
Autumn Leaves
Today I took my first "leaf flight." This is one of those wonderful experiences that is reserved for pilots and their friends, and one I'd only heard about before today. Rather than seeing only one tree or a small group of trees that have colorful leaves, you can see the beautiful painting created by the various colored trees scattered along the face of the earth. It's quite a sight!
This was only my second VFR flight in the latter half of this year, and my first solo flight since... Well, a LONG time ago. If I don't have a CFI with me, I like to take friends and family along for the ride, so I don't fly by myself much. It was certainly nice to not have the workload of IFR, and to be able to look out the windows!
I took off from runway 32 at about 4 PM. I began by turning to the southwest over Lake Mendota to get some shots of the capitol, then west over Middleton to get some pictures of home and of the new runway at Morey. There weren't a whole lot of great leaf views in this area, it's still mostly green.
I turned North a bit west of Morey and got a traffic call. It's amazing how small an airplane looks from just a mile (or about 15 seconds head-on closure) away! I got a picture of the Cessna off my left wing, and continued on my way toward the Dells. I got some pictures at Devil's Lake. From there, I roughly followed the Wisconsin River up until I was abeam R-6904 and then headed towards Wausau. I got excellent service from Chicago Center and Minneapolis Center and got a couple of pics of other planes, including a Mesaba Saab 900 (MeSaaba? ;-) turboprop landing on runway 35 at CWA.
The leaves were best right up in the Wausau area. Entire hillsides spackled with deep reds and bright oranges and yellows surrounded me. I clicked quite a few photos of those, and also of the company I work for. Finally I slid into the pattern for runway 30 at AUW to make it an "official" cross country (110nm).
The folks at Wausau were very nice - It appears to be a family-owned operation and they have lots of historical info, model planes hanging from the ceiling, and good (if a bit old) facilities. Certainly a place I'd stop at again.
After chatting with them for a while, I took some pictures of N2159Q, my steed for the day. I got a great one with the plane silhouetted in the sun. Then, I flew off into the sunset. Well, almost... I took off on 300 and headed straight out. I tried to find a nearby corn maze, but I wasn't sure of the exact location so I curved back around to the south.
My initial climb was to 3500... I wanted to let the sun set and then climb to see if I could get a second look at it. No such luck (What should I really expect, it was only a Warrior) but it was a spectacular sunset and I got lots of great photos.
The return trip was pretty uneventful. Pilotage was a tad more difficult since the ground was now poorly lit, but the city lights weren't really coming on a whole lot yet and neither were the airport beacons. In fact, the first beacon I saw was Portage (though I did see the REILs at Wautoma) and that was when I was nearly home (read: it was dark enough that the city lights were on too...). So, I flew on the 175 radial from AUW until I could pick up Madison and ride V177. However, I decided to get some pictures of the capitol at night so I turned toward the west side.
The only "event" of the night was when I was headed towards the west side and noticed the lights were on at Camp Randall. I asked Approach about it and they said there was no TFR tonight. (The Badgers were in Columbus pounding the heck out of Ohio State, the lights were on for some high school games.)
Well, OK, there was one more event. The breaker popped on my landing light sometime during the approach. So, I got to do my first no-light landing since my private training a year and a half ago. It's a lot more difficult to do when you're expecting the light to be there (ie you don't see your CFI switch it off!) and you're almost on the ground before you realize it's gone. I flared a little high, added some power, and just flew down the runway a ways until I felt more stable and put her down. After clearing the runway I flipped the switch off, reset the breaker, and switched it back on and it worked fine. An interesting end to a very neat flight.
This was only my second VFR flight in the latter half of this year, and my first solo flight since... Well, a LONG time ago. If I don't have a CFI with me, I like to take friends and family along for the ride, so I don't fly by myself much. It was certainly nice to not have the workload of IFR, and to be able to look out the windows!
I took off from runway 32 at about 4 PM. I began by turning to the southwest over Lake Mendota to get some shots of the capitol, then west over Middleton to get some pictures of home and of the new runway at Morey. There weren't a whole lot of great leaf views in this area, it's still mostly green.
 |
| The State Capitol and the rest of the isthmus from about 2000 feet over Lake Mendota. |
I turned North a bit west of Morey and got a traffic call. It's amazing how small an airplane looks from just a mile (or about 15 seconds head-on closure) away! I got a picture of the Cessna off my left wing, and continued on my way toward the Dells. I got some pictures at Devil's Lake. From there, I roughly followed the Wisconsin River up until I was abeam R-6904 and then headed towards Wausau. I got excellent service from Chicago Center and Minneapolis Center and got a couple of pics of other planes, including a Mesaba Saab 900 (MeSaaba? ;-) turboprop landing on runway 35 at CWA.
 |
| Devil's Lake from the north at 4500 feet. |
The leaves were best right up in the Wausau area. Entire hillsides spackled with deep reds and bright oranges and yellows surrounded me. I clicked quite a few photos of those, and also of the company I work for. Finally I slid into the pattern for runway 30 at AUW to make it an "official" cross country (110nm).
 |
| A hillside near Wausau just before sunset. |
The folks at Wausau were very nice - It appears to be a family-owned operation and they have lots of historical info, model planes hanging from the ceiling, and good (if a bit old) facilities. Certainly a place I'd stop at again.
After chatting with them for a while, I took some pictures of N2159Q, my steed for the day. I got a great one with the plane silhouetted in the sun. Then, I flew off into the sunset. Well, almost... I took off on 300 and headed straight out. I tried to find a nearby corn maze, but I wasn't sure of the exact location so I curved back around to the south.
 |
| Warrior N2159Q, my wings for this particular adventure. |
My initial climb was to 3500... I wanted to let the sun set and then climb to see if I could get a second look at it. No such luck (What should I really expect, it was only a Warrior) but it was a spectacular sunset and I got lots of great photos.
 |
| The eastern sky opposite the sunset. The haze layers create an interesting rainbow effect with just the red through blue hues that can only be seen from the sky, and unfortunately can't be completely captured by a camera - But here's my best try. |
 |
| The Wisconsin River meanders below a beautiful sunset. |
 |
| No words needed. |
The return trip was pretty uneventful. Pilotage was a tad more difficult since the ground was now poorly lit, but the city lights weren't really coming on a whole lot yet and neither were the airport beacons. In fact, the first beacon I saw was Portage (though I did see the REILs at Wautoma) and that was when I was nearly home (read: it was dark enough that the city lights were on too...). So, I flew on the 175 radial from AUW until I could pick up Madison and ride V177. However, I decided to get some pictures of the capitol at night so I turned toward the west side.
The only "event" of the night was when I was headed towards the west side and noticed the lights were on at Camp Randall. I asked Approach about it and they said there was no TFR tonight. (The Badgers were in Columbus pounding the heck out of Ohio State, the lights were on for some high school games.)
 |
| The capitol and isthmus at night, this time from above the western part of Lake Monona facing North. |
Well, OK, there was one more event. The breaker popped on my landing light sometime during the approach. So, I got to do my first no-light landing since my private training a year and a half ago. It's a lot more difficult to do when you're expecting the light to be there (ie you don't see your CFI switch it off!) and you're almost on the ground before you realize it's gone. I flared a little high, added some power, and just flew down the runway a ways until I felt more stable and put her down. After clearing the runway I flipped the switch off, reset the breaker, and switched it back on and it worked fine. An interesting end to a very neat flight.