Not long after becoming a private pilot I decided to go on a fly-out with a group from our airport.  The group was full of seasoned aviators and a couple of cubs; myself and my buddy Bob.  The plan was to fly out from Oakdale down to Laughlin, NV.   The day of the flyout arrived but we had a high overcast and some light rain.  I wasn’t too thrilled about flying so far in these conditions but the more seasoned aviators assured me everything would be fine.  These systems come in from the north and generally don’t extend that far south.  That sounded reasonable to my inexperienced ears so the whole gaggle departed Oakdale to the south.

We got as far as Visalia and then it started raining pretty good.  We decided to stop for lunch and see if the rain would stop.  We called the local Holiday Inn which sent a shuttle to take us over to their restaurant.  We had a great lunch and were in good spirits all around.  We got back to the airport and an hour later the rain stopped.  We all topped off our tanks and were about to head south.  However, one of the most seasoned aviators said that he wasn’t comfortable pushing on in this weather.  He said he was going to be a chicken and head back home.  We bid him goodbye and he headed north while we all headed south.

As we headed south we kept having to climb to get over broken cloud layers.  Soon we had climbed above the overcast and were in bright sunny skies.  However, we were VFR on top.  But the sun seemed so bright and cheery after the clouds and rain below us we felt that the worst was behind us.

Our trusty 172M was purring like a kitten and winging us southeastward over Mohave.  By now we were a long, loose formation.  We had lost site of the 182 in the lead, and the 172 had lost site of us.  The PA-12 was still somewhere below us under the cloud deck.  We began to get concerned because the solid cloud layer was showing no signs of breaking up.  Our seasoned aviator had assured us it would break up soon.  It wasn’t.

The sun was now getting lower in the sky, just above the cloud layer by a few inches and we had finally arrived above Laughlin according to our GPS and our VORs.   We were ecstatic, there was a small hole in the clouds and we could just make out the airport and the hole was just big enough to circle down through.  The 182 and I were orbiting the hole and letting the trail guy in the 170 know that it was there.  He was still 25 miles out and begged us not to leave him up there alone.  We told him we’d circle the hole until he got there.  Then the hole closed up solid.

We asked the 170 where he was… he didn’t know.  So there we were, circling above an airport we couldn’t get to, waiting for a guy who didn’t know where he was, the needles on the fuel gauges were bouncing near empty, and the sun was setting.  The next 5 minutes passed intolerably slowly.  Finally the radio crackles with the sound of the guy in the 170.  “Hey guys!  I’m over the airport I’ll see you on the ground!”

Airport?!  What airport?!

We asked him what airport he was at because we couldn’t get to Laughlin.  No answer.  We were just evaluating our options when he comes back on the radio, “Oh, guess what guys, I’m in Kingman!  Not Laughlin!”  Bob and I looked at each other and then Bob punched Kingman into the GPS.  The 182 radioed that he was flying direct to Kingman.  We answered that we were right behind him.  The 170 radioed back that the sky was clear over Kingman.  We were so relieved!

However, we were about 15 miles south of Kingman and we were still over the cloud layer.  I told Bob we’re going to have to descend through it.  We lined up with the valley heading due north toward the airport and I got on the gauges.  I told him to call the ground as soon as he saw it.  It was the longest 10 seconds of my life. But that about how long I counted in my head before Bob said he had the ground.  I briefly looked away from the instruments to confirm we really did have the ground, we did.

As I turned onto downwind for Kingman the runway lights came on.  The fuel gauge needles were no longer bouncing, they were pegged on E.  I made an unremarkable landing and taxied up to the tie down where the 182 had just finished taking on fuel.  The fuel truck filled me up after I had parked and tied down.  He gave me the receipt and didn’t say a word.  I looked at the number of gallons we took on and estimated we had approximately 20 minutes of fuel left in the tanks.  If that.  I was never so happy to see the end of a flight.

Ironic twist to the story.  Remember the most seasoned aviator that turned back?  That was a good call but… the very next day he was involved in a classic highwing/lowing landing accident.  His 175 was totaled when  Piper Cherokee landed on top of him. Luckily no one was injured but both planes were a complete loss.

Okay so one of the joys of being a pilot is being able to brag about the places you visit. So here goes. I’ve been wanting to take a longer flight than just flitting around my local area for a while now but the weather hasn’t been cooperating. Today was the perfect day for a road trip, er, air trip! The weather was perfect, a little overcast, temps in the 70’s, no wind to speak of, great early Spring day. Yep. It’s beach weather so I headed to the coast.

I had a hankerin’ for fish so Half Moon Bay was the destination. Specifically, Barbara’s Fish Trap. So I launched into the hazy air of California’s Central Valley.  My direction of flight was to make a beeline for the Altamont Pass, then directly to Sunol, the Dunbarton Bridge, then to squeeze between Palo Alto and San Carlos’ airspace and then pop over the hill to Half Moon Bay. This would keep me out of the San Francisco Class B airspace and out of the numerous Class D’s I just mentioned.

The flight was perfect. A little hazy but that’s what it’s like when we don’t have wind. I scooted over the Altamont, tuned to Livermore and watched for their traffic as I skirted their Class D. Passed over the Sunol grade just as planned, past Mission Peak in Fremont and then headed toward the bay and the Dunbarton Bridge. That’s when my GPS lost signal. Crap. I waited a minute and it came back. Great. As I went feet wet over the bay, my GPS lost signal again. Crap again. I was only about 20 minutes from KHAF at this point. I’d hate to have to turn around now. I didn’t need it to keep from getting lost, I needed to navigate the 1 mile wide corridor between Palo Alto and San Carlos’ respective Class D airspace. The GPS came back and then stayed solid so I continued on.

I kept a close eye on the jumbos on final for San Francisco and also for any traffic coming out of Palo Alto. I finally popped over the hills and made it to the coast. Ah, sweet relief.

There was only one plane in the pattern at KHAF, I announced, joined the pattern, and landed within minutes. The taxi to the tie downs was LONG. It took about 10 minutes to taxi to the tie downs closest to the gate into town. I got there and tied my ship down. Walked up to the gate, wrote the code down on my arm so I could get back in with out walking another mile to the terminal.

Once through the gate it’s only a 5 minute walk to Barbara’s. It’s located right on the beach with a view of the marina. I got there before they opened so I just walked along the piers watching the fishermen unload and listening to the fog horn. I finally got the fish lunch I had been salivating over. Since Cristy wasn’t with me, I bought her a togo box of fish and then headed back to the airport.



The wind had changed so I had to taxi all the way from one end of the field to the other, 15 minutes of taxiing! I finally got to the other end, did my run up and launched into the air to the south toward the marina. I was already at 1000 MSL before I got to the marina so I did a slow 180 to point back to the north.  For my trip home I decided to fly north, skirt San Francisco, fly over the Golden Gate Bridge, and do the north bay tour around to Suisun Bay, past Mt. Diablo, and then into the valley and then beeline home from there. And that’s pretty much what I did.

(The domed building in the lower portion of the picture has special meaning to me. It’s called the Palace of Fine Arts and is where Cristy first kissed me)

The entire trip was uneventful, not really the best sight seeing weather but good flying weather. It took me an hour and 6 minutes to get there and an hour and 20 minutes to get home. This would normally be a 3 hour trip one way through horrendous traffic. I love flying!