Author: The Flying Dutchman

I am a man who loves Christ, loves my wife, loves my family, loves my church, and loves aviation. In that order.

Playa Del Carmen – Day 2

On By The Flying DutchmanIn TravelLeave a comment

Day two was our first full day in Playa Del Carmen. Our plan for the day had only two items on it: lay on the beach and be idle, and go into town to buy some shoes. They would not let me got to dinner without dress shoes.

The first part of the plan was very easy. Mrs. Dutchman and I headed down to the beach lounges and dropped our stuff off. We headed immediately into the warm Carribean Sea. The water there is just the best in the world. Warm, calm, and clear. Actually it wasn’t that calm as a major storm had just blown through over the last three days. The surf was a little high but still nothing like the Atlantic or Pacific oceans.

After playing and swimming in the surf for about an hour or so we headed back up to the lounge chairs to catch some rays. The security guard on the beach brought us a large shade for the lounge chairs. So we sat in the shade and sipped drinks until about 2pm. The waiter kept bringing us drinks as soon as it looked like our glasses were about half full. He also kept snacks coming too.

At about 2pm it started to get a little cloudy and drizzle a little so we thought this would be a good time to go into town to find shoes. I went across the street from the resort and found an ATM so I could get some local cash. While there I talked to a guy who told me a good place to buy some shoes. Mrs. Dutchman and I grabbed a cab and rode across town to a very nice shopping mall. We were a little worried as to how we would get back to the hotel but found that we didn’t need to worry. There are cabs everywhere. We found a shoe store in the mall but the folks there spoke less English than I spoke Spanish. Somehow we made ourselves understood and I was able to get a nice pair of shoes. We bought some socks in the superstore across from the shoe store and then went outside to find a taxi. There was one already waiting so we jumped and said “Zona Hotelero, por favor, Royal Hideaway” At which the cabbie said “si” and took off like a shot. A cab ride anywhere in Playa Del Carmen is $50 pesos, or $5 American. That’s a pretty good deal.

After getting back from our shopping mall adventure we rested up and got ready for dinner.  Dinner was one of the more mildly disappointing parts of the trip for me.  Don’t get me wrong the food was excellent.  Mrs. Dutchman loved it.  The problem was that it was all gourmet food.  Just wonderful.  But I didn’t come to Mexico to eat gourmet Italian, Asian, or Spanish food, I came to eat Mexican food!  Well… Mrs. Dutchman loved it so I just suffered (sic) in silence.


After dinner each night we followed the same routine.  We would walk down to the beach, kick off our shoes and walk along the shore in the moonlight.  The moon was full the week we were there which made it very picturesque and very conducive to making Mrs. Dutchman very happy.  And when Mrs. Dutchman is happy, the Flying Dutchman is even happier.

Playa Del Carmen Day 1

On By The Flying DutchmanIn TravelLeave a comment

We’ve been back from our vacation for a couple of weeks now. I haven’t have much time to update this site because of all the catch up I had to do. Catching up on work, catching up with friends I had been neglecting, catching up with church matters. It seems like trying to catch up when you get back from a vacation takes twice as long as the vacation.

Well Mrs Flying Dutchman and I really enjoyed our vacation. Playa Del Carmen is beautiful. I have to confess that I had some preconceptions about Mexico. The only other cities in Mexico I had ever visted was Tijuana and Juarez. Playa Del Carmen, or Xaman Ha (pronounced shaman hah) as it was called by the Mayan Indians, is nothing like those two cities. The people were very friendly and polite, the town was clean and well-kept, and the setting absolutely breath-taking.

The first day was a long travel day. We departed Sacramento at 6:30am, laid over in Houston for 3 hours and then flew on to Cancun and didn’t land there until around 6:30pm or so. Customs in Mexico is a fairly simple process. We filled out the tourist visa paperwork on the plane just prior to landing. The paperwork was provided by the airline. There is an odd lottery used in Cancun for customs inspections, just prior to exiting the customs area one member of the family presses a button on a traffic light, if the light is red then you have to let customs inspect your luggage. If the light turns green, you grab your bags and go.

We had purchased a transfer to our hotel in Playa Del Carmen and the transportation company representative was waiting outside. They identified us almost before we could identify them. They whisked us into a car by ourselves and our driver took us on our 40 minute drive to Playa Del Carmen. There are some interesting features of the highway we were on. They have topes in the middle of the highway just outside the towns. These things are speed bumps on steroids. Traffic slows to a crawl to get across these things.

We finally got to our hotel and were greeted with moist, scented, and very cold towels along with glasses of champagne. It was about 8:30pm by this time. The bell captain took us down the path to our building and room. The room was great. Cool marble floors, marble vanity in the bathroom, marble shower, it was all wonderful. There was even a small refrigerator in the room full of water, soda, and beer. All I could think was, wonderful, more alcohol. Those who know me will see the humor in that.

We just had time to clean up before we headed over to the restaurant where the front desk had made us reservations for dinner. This particular restaurant was chosen because it had a loose dress code and I didn’t have dress shoes. I was informed that I would have to get some dress shoes before I would be allowed in the other restaurants on the resort. Oh well, something to put on the list of things to do. Even the casual restaurant was very formal. Dinner was served in courses and the waiter wore a tux.

After dinner we took a quick walk on the beach and then headed back to our room to collapse into unconsciousness.

More prayer for Christ’s church

On By The Flying DutchmanIn FaithLeave a comment

In the past few weeks we have had a child diagnosed with type 1 Diabetes, the second daughter in that family with such a diagnosis, we have had a child attacked by a dog while on a camping trip, we have had a young man experience minor burns in a propane stove explosion, we have had a young man involved in a motorcycle accident. And our church continues to wrestle with the issues for which I was asking prayer in the previous posting. This just feels like a spiritual attack. Please continue to pray for Christ’s church and that God would glorify Himself through all this.

Prayer for Christ’s Church

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Faith4 Comments

I have no illusions about who reads my blog.  I know it is only about a handful of regulars and then the odd internet surfer who stumbles upon it and then moves on.  I know my regulars (all three of you 🙂  ) are Godly men.  If you have stumbled upon my blog and are a Godly man then praise God.  I am asking for any and all Godly men who read this to please pray for our church.  This is not a huge life-altering issue for most.  But it affects some of God’s most frail and easily damaged sheep.  Please pray for wisdom on the part of our church leaders.  Please pray that God’s will be done.  Thank you.

Oshkosh. You gotta’ be there!

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Aviation, TravelLeave a comment

Well where does the time go? I had intended to document every day of my visit to Oshkosh but that just never happened. We were either too busy or just plain too whooped to do anything when we got back. So now I’ll just give you a run down of this my 3rd and best trip to OSH yet.

Two things made my trip to Oshkosh this time around much more fun; one, I went with my buddies from our local EAA Chapter 90, and two, Skype. More on Skype later.

The trip to Oshkosh was a long one. We first drove from Modesto to San Jose. This was made more bearable by my not having to drive and sharing a car with 3 other guys who love airplanes and talking about aviation. The traveling buddies were Brian Braun, Keith Braun, Kevin Haslebacher, and myself. (Many thanks go to Brian Braun for driving us to and from all airports on our journey.) The first leg of our trip took us from San Jose to Salt Lake City where we had about a 4 hour layover. Again this was made bearable by having your buddies around. After the layover the second leg of the flight took us to Milwaukee. The first thing we did was to pick up the rental car. The friendly and courteous agent informed us that we were late, and after not being helpful assigned our mini-van. After a brief 45 minute search and going back to ask the friendly agent where the van was, the van was finally located and we were on the road to Oshkosh. But what the hey, you’re with your airplane buddies.

We finally arrived at the rental house at around 2am. Ah, home at last. Kevin BenZiger who arranged the rental house warned us ahead of time that the house may not be that clean. Well, he was right. When I got into my bedroom I pulled back the comforter to find… cat fur. So I pulled back the top sheet to find… cat fur. Okay, kitty fur is soft and fun to pet but I don’t want to sleep in it. Luckily I found a blanket and was able to sleep on top of the comforter where at least I couldn’t see the fur. But what they hey, you’re with your airplane buddies. All of Chapter 90’s Oshkosh contingent were finally together; Ken Scott, Kevin BenZiger, Kevin Haslebacher, Keith Braun, Brian Braun, and Scott VanArtsdalen.
When we finally got to the show on Tuesday morning, all was forgotten and all we could think about is the magic that lay before us. All airplane, all day. We spent part of the first day just walking the flight line looking at all the Van’s RV aircraft that were parked there. The number of RVs in attendance every year grows. There was even a 35 ship formation of Van’s RVs doing flyovers. 35 RVs flying together sound pretty spectacular. We checked out paint jobs, got some great building ideas, and just generally enjoyed seeing the variety of aircraft there. One of the star RVs in attendance was Trey Johnson’s amphibious RV-7. The workmanship was excellent and was somewhat reminiscent of the Schneider Cup racers of yesteryear.

Next we visited some of the kit aircraft and engine manufacturers. I can’t begin to remember all the booths we stopped at but among them were Eggenfelner, Van’s, Zenith, and Sonex. We also looked at several automotive and diesel conversions.

Then it was off to the exhibit halls. I’m not even going to try to name every vendor and manufacturer we saw. Just think of one and they had a booth there. One of the highlights of the show for me was the Vertical Power booth. Vertical Power is doing for electrical systems what the EFIS did for flight instruments. Their flagship product is something they have nicknamed the digital copilot. It’s basically an electrical system in a box that is wired to a computer. There are only three switches to the whole system. You punch in a security code and the computer starts your engine for you. Flaps are deployed, boost pump is turned on, lights come on all automatically at just the right times. A lot of people ask why you would want to do that but a lot of people ask why anyone would want to use an EFIS and those are becoming very popular. In fact anyone and everyone is coming out with an EFIS. Up and coming are the Czechs who had two separate companies displaying their avionics.

Another highlight of the exhibit halls for me was to meet an old internet friend who use to work for Control Vision on their Anywhere Map product and has since started working for Dynon. He told me some of the things you can expect to see from Dynon in the near future; a moving map and an auto pilot for starters.

Even though we were all pretty tired by the end of the first day I had arranged to meet some friends of mine ( http://www.rivetbangers.com ) for dinner. The rest of the Chapter 90 contingent (dubbed the 209 Posse) agreed to come along. As testament to what a wonderful hobby we engage in even though our Chapter 90 gang didn’t know anyone there, within minutes all were talking to complete strangers about homebuilt aircraft. The restaurant was called The Black Otter Dining Club and their specialty is prime rib. I ordered the little girly cut called the Queen Cut. It was a mere 32 oz of DELICIOUS prime rib. They also have what they call the King Cut which is 160 oz, yes that’s 10 pounds of prime rib. Two people have finished one and gotten their dinners for free. The staff would not tell me where those two people are buried. We then returned to our rental house tired, fed, and happy. And that was just the first day.

To write all the things we did each day would take a couple hours to read so I’ll just hit some of the highlights. Cessna previewed their new light sport aircraft called the 162 Sky Catcher. I’ve heard it called everything from Sky Chicken to Sky Scratcher. Call it what you want it was a slick little bird with an all glass panel designed exclusively for Cessna by Garmin and even had two cup holders. Long overdue Cessna. They were taking $5000 deposits and had a board showing the running total; close to 600 by the time we left Osh on Friday. This was making the other LSA manufacturers feel very good. When Cessna steps in you know there is money to be made. There were also a couple of very light jets which held the attention of several members of Chapter 90. Sonex announced their battery powered prototype airplane.

Also worth noting was the barbecue we attended on Wednesday evening. It is put on by Bob Collins who puts out a weekly RV newsletter and host a Yahoo group dedicated to RV-7 builders and entusiasts. It was a veritable who’s who in the world of Van’s RV. The only notable absence was Van’s Aircraft but I have a feeling that will change next year. Bob put on a GREAT spread for only $10 a head. Even the short downpour didn’t dampen anyone’s spirits. Bob had some great door prizes to give away including t-shirts, hats, and some even better stuff including a free e-mag or p-mag, $5000 off on a Superior engine, and even a free empenage kit from Van’s Aircraft. Chapter 90 even had a winner when Kevin won an Angle of Attack display from Advanced Flight Systems worth $800. Again, we didn’t know most of the people there but you could start up a conversation with anyone simply by saying, “So, whatcha’ building?” Bob Collins has a winner in this BBQ and I can’t wait to attend it again.

That was two of the things that really made this Oshkosh one of the best I’ve ever attended. Having my friends with me, meeting friends I have made on the Internet and never met in person, was a fun experience. Skype also made the convention more fun for me. Skype is a software program that you can run on any PC and use like a telephone. If you have a video camera built into your PC then you can have video calls. This is exactly what I did each evening. It was easier being far away from my family if I could see them in full video on my computer every evening. Nothing like watching your kids make silly faces for 20 minutes or so. The best part about Skype is that it is completely free.

There were a few downsides to Oshkosh this year. One was that Kevin BenZiger was sick the whole time. Many thanks go to Kevin B for arranging our housing this year. Cats and all, thanks for setting that up for us Kevin and a BIG thank you from me personally. Also the landing accident between two P-51’s on Friday afternoon which left one man dead. You hate to hear about anyone getting hurt in aviation and when they take a historically significant aircraft with them it’s a double loss.

Happily for us we all made it back safe and sound to Oakdale each with his fill of Oshkosh for the year. I was pretty much done with Oshkosh and not eager to go back. I have a feeling though that next July I’ll be wishing I could go again. If you’ve never been to AirVenture please try to attend it just once. It does get tiring after several days but while you’re there it is just magical. Oshkosh: You gotta’ be there!

On the ground at Oshkosh

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Aviation, TravelLeave a comment

Just spent my first full day at Oshkosh. My feet are killing me, my sinuses are killing me, but I’m happy, what a fun day. My friends and I spent the day browsing the aircraft vendors, checking out new products and technologies, and the different airplanes on the flight line. That actually took ALL day there was so much to see. Some of my favorite technologies were:

Possibly one of the biggest news items of the week so far is Cessna’s new LSA offering the Cessna 162 Sky Catcher: Cessna Sky Catcher website

This will be a plane to watch. It will signal whether or not the LSA market will be viable or not. Cessna joining the LSA fray has emboldened other LSA manufacturers and is actually a welcome development to them.

Tomorrow promises to be a more laid back day. We’re going to casually walk the flight line and just check out all the airplanes.

RV-7 Empenage is finished

On By The Flying DutchmanIn RV-7Leave a comment

Well, after several months of on again off again construction I have finally completed the empenage of the RV-7. The empenage is more popularly known as the tail. This is made up of the vertical stabilizer, the rudder, the horizontal stabilizer, and the elevators. There is still some minor fiberglass work to be done but it can and should probably wait until the empenage is mounted to the fuselage. I will be ordering the wings when I travel to Oshkosh next month.

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Wednesday afternoon in downtown Modesto

On By The Flying DutchmanIn OpinionLeave a comment

I can’t believe where technology has gone in the past few years. For instance, I’m sitting in Picasso’s, a downtown Modesto cafe, and just finished a delicious sandwich. I’m listening to a guitar player strumming from the corner of the room, the lawyers and administrative clerks are hurrying by on the sidewalk trying to get back to work before lunch is over. I’m connected and online and able to update this website from this cafe. This is something I could have only imagined just a few years ago.

I’m just as amazed where God has taken me in the past few years. He tests my faith on almost a daily basis with my new job. I go into the week thinking I’m swamped, not knowing how I’m going to handle the problems I face; staffing shortages, unhappy customers, knowledge and memory shortages (on my part). The more I try to handle it the deeper I feel I’m sinking. Then I remember to pray about my problems, not really to ask God to “fix” my problems, but just to place myself in His hands. I just consciously stop worrying about the problems and subconsciously leave them in God’s hands. What a difference. I feel more content, more joyful and many of the problems seem to resolve themselves. I guess one could make the argument that they were never my problems in the first place. I think they were; I just think God uses these problems to cement my faith.

These days, I find myself more joyful than I used to be even when things do go my way. I find myself trying to ignore the pretty girls with skimpy dresses on the sidewalk rather than indulging my eyes. I find myself trying to deal with everyone as if they are my brother. I am always successful? Absolutely not. Still, it’s something that I could only have imagined a few years ago.

Yes… it’s amazing how far things have come.

( Thank you Cristy for praying for me without ceasing )

What have YOU done for the Lord?

On By The Flying DutchmanIn FaithLeave a comment

Many have read John Piper’s Desiring God. I’m actually reading another of Piper’s books which is really a flip side to the coin.  It’s entitled, When I Don’t Desire God.  I selected this book because firstly my wife wanted to do a book study with me, and secondly because many times I find I don’t deisre God or doing the things that pleases God.  Don’t get me wrong I try my best to do the things that God finds pleasing, but I don’t always feel a driving desire to do them.

Piper explains that this is something we must fight for.  We must pray fervently to God and plead with Him to instill in us the desire for Him.  Piper makes some seemingly contradictory assertions; he says that we are ordered to “Rejoice in the Lord” yet we cannot rejoice in the Lord because we are by nature sinful people.  That in fact we cannot rejoice in the Lord unless God bestows upon us the gift of rejoicing in the Lord.  And further that we are not less guilty of breaking the commandment to rejoice in the Lord because of this fact, bat all the more guilty because of this fact.  Piper points out that our prayers should take on urgency because of this.  We should be even more grateful because of the gifts God gives us.

We should be thankful to God not just for life, not just for salvation, not just for Christ, but for the very belief that we have, for the joy that we feel, for everything that we have, that we do, that we are is a gift from God.