The God View

Somewhere on the (simulated) ILS RWY 16R into Van Nuys (KVNY) I can hear John clacking away on the keyboard behind me and to my right. Cool! I think — he's cooking something up to make my life harder. Sure enough, closer in on the approach, I start hearing thunder over the sound of the engine, and drops of water start hitting the screen. Not as visually disturbing (or just disturbing, in its own way…) as the prancing deer he had on the runway on the simulated FREES8 departure out of Santa Rosa (KSTS) a short time earlier, but in real life much more dangerous. But this isn't real life, and, sadly, the simulator doesn't rock or shake or buck wildly in the storm, and after telling John in real life I'd back right out of this approach now with ATC help, I fly on regardless, successfully breaking out a little above minimums and landing as well as one can in a sim like this (i.e. badly).

I've done this approach in real life (see e.g. "One Six Right"), and the real life version's much more scenic (especially at night), but I don't have the luxury of being able to do it in real life until I get IFR current again. Which is why I'm here at the sim, doing the remainder of the IPC with John. The time goes quickly, with a barrage of approaches, holds, departures, prancing deer, instrument failures, etc., and after what seems like a sweaty forever, I'm current again. It's been a long trek back, but worth it, I think, and I start thinking about a real-life trek to Van Nuys or Burbank later this year in one of the club's DA-40s, with the usual IFR leg into and back out of the LA basin. We shall see, as I keep saying.

Later, John sends me the picture above of the God View from the session, with the storms bearing down on the approach from the west. The joys of simulation….

Nothing Goes Horribly Wrong...

Somewhere 3,500' over the Diablo Valley, setting up for the RNAV 28L approach back into Hayward (KWHD) as I'm under the Cone of Stupidity in 7PV, Foreflight on my little old iPad mini just ... disappears. The screen goes blank; I'm locked out of the system. The proper response under these conditions should be a shrugged Simpsonian "meh", and a mental note to debug / fix the issue in a minute or two when I've got the time, not when I'm setting things up on the G1000 or trying to keep up with ATC on the radio (never mind actually just, you know, flying the plane). After all, I'm in a G1000-equipped DA-40 in VMC, John is sitting there in the right seat as instructor, and at this point in the (pre-) approach, the iPad's just not essential. But, of course, the engineer in me takes over and I try to fix and debug it all there and then, with the predictable result that I miss a call from ATC and (to mangle metaphors) generally lose the thread of what I'm doing in the big picture.

Oh well — another good lesson, one I thought I'd learned years ago, but that obviously needs to be hammered back into that poor little brain of mine again. But Foreflight and the iPad come back, and things go on as before — a weirdly-enjoyable couple of hours of little failures and well-received lessons (from John and / or what passes for Real Life under the hood).

* * *

The aim of today's flight is to continue my (possibly-Quixotic) attempts to get instrument current again. And overall, nothing goes horribly wrong — the basics, such as staying the right way up and within IPC tolerances for altitude and heading, etc., are generally OK, and it's really enjoyable decoupling the autopilot and just flying the plane by hand on the approach back into Hayward or on the departure out of Napa, but I spend much of the flight not feeling entirely on top of things. Again, not the serious things — I don’t think I have any real issues with either of the approaches we do (the KAPC VOR 6 with circle to land on 18R (probably my last ever VOR approach — we do it because we still can), and KHWD’s RNAV 28L) or the LIZRD 3 departure out of Napa; even the home-made 7 DME arc to the final approach course at Napa feels straightforward (I used to find these difficult to visualise in the old steam gauge era, but nowadays they’re just “obvious”). But my handling of the integrated GFC 700 autopilot was agricultural, to put it mildly, and my radio work was often really bad (missed calls, indecision, saying way too much on air, etc.). Plus my engine management skills always seem to go to pot under the hood. But the flight director was magic — I’ll be using that as much as possible in the future, regardless of whether or not the AP is properly coupled.

Overall, a good series of lessons, and I don't feel that it's too unlikely I could get current in the next few weeks; I'm off to Bogotá in July for several weeks of work, so I want to try to have it all sewn up by then. If not, it's not going to be the end of the world.

* * *

(And the cause of the iPad's blanking? I'd blame heat if it had been a warmer day and the sun had been intense, but it was a standard Bay Area coastal summer's day (sort of like a London summer's day but gloomier), and I don't think it was that. I know it's happened to other pilots here and there, but it's new to me. Again, though, it's hardly a catastrophe, and when I set up an approach correctly, it's not the sort of failure that should cause me much more than a jolt of irritation...).

Get The Bloody Job Done

"Huey" EMU 309 UH-1H at Hayward Airport Open Day

Hayward Airport (KHWD) Open Day, again — another wonderful couple of hours of strolling and exploring odd and interesting airplanes and helicopters at my home airport in the company of my two little nephews Simon and Alex (five and seven years old respectively). This isn't really an airshow (although on nice days there's a bit of flying, which has to be tempered by the fact that Hayward's right under the ILS for Oakland's runway 30, some six nautical miles to the west) — it's much more of (as it says) an open day, where locals, pilots, aviation associations, clubs, businesses, etc., get to see each other and interact.

We get there fairly early — just after the 10am opening — and spend the next ninety minutes exploring the insides and cockpit of the Moffet-based California Air National Guard C130 parked there (the insides are layered and packed with an astonishing array of 1960's and 1970's-era gear and wiring; the cockpit's a classic steam gauge ensemble (see below)); sitting in and exploring the Huey Vets EMU Huey (above — this has special resonance for me given both the RAN connection and the fact that Hueys (we called them "Iroquois") were such a visible (and very audible) part of my childhood in Australia); watching the Hayward Police Department showing off its little robot (the star of the show for the seven-year-old); the classic cars; the gleamingly-polished and nicely done up old four-engined JetStar business jet that I mentioned in a previous posting; watching the old EAA Ford Trimotor start up, taxi past, and depart; visiting the California Airways booth; and just generally strolling around looking at all the various small planes parked on the tarmac.

One of the things I like most about the Open Day is that it's so obviously full of locals. It's a diverse crowd in every way, and seeing all the local kids clambering over the C-130 or Huey or asking questions about the HPD's little robot or lining up for a short free flight in a small GA plane gives me some sort of hope for the world.

Highly recommended if you get the chance to go next time!

 

Alex at the controls of the California ANG C-130

EAA Ford Trimotor Taxiing Past

Just Another Bay Tour

Bay Tours are never routine for me — they're always full of wonderful sights, they're fun flying (if sometimes a little stressful with all that dodging other sightseeing planes and keeping out of the Class B airspace just above us), and the person or people I'm with usually enjoy it immensely. And so it is today, with my friend RS, who's never flown in a light plane before but is game to try it.

We depart Hayward (KHWD) in perfect cloudless VFR in one of the club's DA-40s, and she seems surprised by how much she enjoys it. She loves the steep(ish) turns, and keeps talking later about how pleasantly-surreal it all felt. She has trouble with the stick when I hand over control to her — she gives up after less than two minutes because she says she has no mental model of how it should work — but doesn’t seem fazed by that. We try to do the classic East Bay-based Bay Tour, but the Golden Gate is completely covered in incoming stratus, and after a few turns around Alcatraz and Angel Island we head off towards Napa (KAPC), where we land and wander across the apron into the terminal, hanging around for a few minutes watching the 1% go by in their shiny corporate jets (actually, pretty much nothing moved on the ramp the entire time we were there).

We get back in and head over towards Livermore (KLVK), doing a fly-by of Crockett (she has connections there), and doing a bunch of touch-and-goes at Livermore (because I can…) before returning via a detour over the Altamont windfarm and back over the hills to Hayward.

She's converted. She asks a lot of good questions about flying procedures (why did you fly at that specific altitude? How do you approach an airport? What happens when the control tower is closed? What are the pedals for if you turn using the stick? etc.) but definitely isn’t interested in being a pilot herself.

Just another Bay Tour? I don't think it's ever just another Bay Tour....

"I Didn't Know It Would Be THIS AWESOME!!"

My little five-year-old nephew Simon looks at me from the back seat of one of the club's DA-40s and says loudly into his headset mic "WOW!! I didn't know it would be THIS AWESOME!!" (he speaks A LOT in UPPER CASE). We're 2,500' over the Golden Gate, circling the bridge, in smooth perfect VMC, and besides Simon there's also Alex (seven), and their mother Annette in the plane. Alex and Annette and I have flown a couple of times before — the last time being just over a year ago — but this is the first time for Simon, and I was worried he wouldn't like it (he's been a lot more apprehensive than Alex about doing things like this — Alex has always just plowed straight in…).

As with Alex's first time, I needn't have worried — Simon's an enthusiastic passenger and spends much of the time pointing out things on the ground, taking photos with Annette's iPhone, and asking me to circle anything interesting (like ships or little islands). Alex is similarly enthusiastic, and given that they're both pretty voluble, I discover just how useful the Garmin panel's pilot isolation switch can be — there's just no way you can easily stop two brothers, five and seven, from arguing or talking loudly about what they're seeing, etc., regardless of what you tell them before you fly. I always find their chatter amusing, but when you're trying to talk to NorCal Approach on flight following as you maneuver around and over the Golden Gate and the rest of the Bay, isolation really comes in handy. I've never actually used that feature before, I think.

* * *

We start a little earlier on the ground at Hayward (KHWD), with both kids really liking the "bubble" canopy (they just call it the bubble) and the general shape of the DA-40; we watch a couple of smaller helicopters taking off, and a rather large one landing, and both kids ask if we could do that. Sadly, no, but we do get to taxi slowly past several interesting planes — an old Stinson (I think), painted in black and white zebra stripes, really took their interest, as did the ancient four-engined JetStar business jet that's been sitting on the tarmac for ages now, looking gleamingly-Modern in an ancient sort of way (think James Bond and "Goldfinger"). Simon asks "what's a business jet?", and I get into a long disquisition about business people and travel and stuff, then realize he doesn't really know what a "business" is. Oh well — Annette takes over the explaining as I do the runup.

After the runup, we take off on 28L for the Oakland transition up over Interstate-880, with views of their home in Alameda off to our left (and my place somewhere below us). The view's wonderful, the air smooth, and the kids are entertained and enjoying things a lot as we head off towards the Golden Gate. They chatter on about the voices on what they call "Mission Control" (they're great NASA and space travel fans); I was worried that the standard headsets I borrowed from CalAir would be too big or uncomfortable, but both kids love wearing the headsets and talking into the microphones, and not for the first time I'm glad there's no push-to-talk in the back of the plane.

It's a busy day, and there are a whole lot of other planes around us, both over the Golden Gate and further afield, and both on-frequency and not. NorCal calls a never-ending stream of traffic for us as I look out as paranoidly as I can; at one stage one of the old local sightseeing seaplanes (a Beaver, I suspect) goes well below us over the Bridge and then up towards Sausalito. Both kids excitedly swear it went under the bridge, but that ain't true (I was watching it like a hawk). After a few times around the Bridge and a pass over Alcatraz and Angel Island, we head off towards San Pablo Bay, where we do the inevitable little roller-coaster(ish) push-over / pull-up that Alex liked so much the last time; this time they both love it and keep asking for more, but Annette's turning green and I decide to head back via the Diablo Valley, where the kids spot all sorts of things on the ground.

Coming back over the hills towards Hayward (with the inevitable "report Cal State Hayward" causing me to do my usual internal eye-rolling) we have some sort of mild audio issues, but I suspect that the combination of four headsets and kids and stuff may explain a lot of that, and the problem clears up after Hayward Tower pings me several times about the quality our transmissions. Oh well — no flight's ever perfect, I guess. But this one was pretty damn good, and the kids tell me they're going to tell their respective classes at school all about it tomorrow. And maybe in another year's time we'll do it again, if not sooner.

And, finally, here's the obligatory formation flying photo my regular readers will probably expect: :-)

Recalculating... At The Next Cloud, Turn Left

I recently mentioned to a techie work colleague that the planes I fly typically have GPS. He was quite surprised that airplanes used GPS, and stood there and said in a very authentic GPS voice "recalculating… at the next cloud, turn left!", which amused us both, probably for rather different reasons... (he may well end up flying with me sometime soon).

All of which is to distract you from the fact that I didn't fly for nearly three months after injuring my shoulder (not too badly, but irritatingly) in a bicycle accident (like John, I ride a bike pretty much daily to get to and from work; unlike him, I do it all at a relatively leisurely pace, and I don't ride nearly as far…), and when I did get back in the saddle (with John in the right seat ensuring I didn't fly too badly), I ended up being unable to blog it in detail because I got sent elsewhere in the United States for work (as I often am) and promptly forgot to blog it.

So what do I remember of the flight? It was supposed to be both a club refresher and a preparation for a potential instrument proficiency check some time in the ever-receding future, but due to some mild instrument issues it turned into a shorter club VFR refresher only. Still an enjoyable flight — in Arpad M's nice new-to-the-club DA-40 (above) — and at least I'm now legal to fly with the club again. I plan to fly a bit more in the next few weeks; we shall see….

Twin Star

This was supposed to have been another of my tediously-long and wordy postings, this time about my introductory flight with John in the Diamond DA-42 Twin Star out of Hayward (KHWD) a couple of weeks ago, but life got in the way, and this is all you'll get. Sorry.

Summary? A really addictively enjoyable — and scarily expensive — hour and half of airwork, engine out exercises, landings at Rio Vista (O88) and Hayward, and a lot of fun just flying around doing 140 KTAS at 11GPH (total!). I don't end up killing anyone or damaging anything, the DA-42 is a joy to fly, and John doesn't swear off instructing as a result of anything I did (well, at least as far as he's told me).

Is there serious multi-engine training in my future? I don't know — I can barely afford single-engined planes — but I've been eyeing a multi add-on for a decade. We shall see, as I always seem to be saying….

You're not supposed to laugh when the critical engine stops…

Blimey, It's Circular!

A few hundred feet above Hayward (KHWD), immediately after departing VFR for Concord (KCCR) on an IFR (re)training flight, I look at the panel in front of me to check my altitude. We're in a Class D airspace (KHWD) under a Class C airspace (KOAK) which is itself under a Class B airspace (KSFO), and I need to keep below 1,500' for the next few miles to avoid blundering into the overlying airspaces. Par for the course, of course, if you fly out of Hayward, but when I look at the altimeter it looks so… weird. I point at it and blurt out something like "Blimey! It's circular!" to John who's in the right seat. John laughs.

This is your brain on steam, I guess. All those circular electro-mechanical steam gauges in front of me — I remember them! — and it's even got an ADF! Mesmerizing, in its own sort of way. Quite a shock to this jaded G1000-spoiled techie, but what did I expect?!  I'm in one of the club's C172's instead of the usual DA-40, and this is obviously going to be an exercise in old-school IFR flying. Flying the way it was when I got my instrument rating a decade ago. Some pilots get nostalgic for this sort of thing, but not me — I'm just a bit bemused and rather apprehensive. It's not just the old steam gauges — can I also cope with being under the hood again after all this time? Can I keep on top of the process and ahead of things on an approach?

* * *

This wasn't really supposed to be about steam gauges or Cessna 172's — it was just supposed to be a way back into IFR flying for me. Which is why I'm flying with John today — to start the long process of getting IFR current and proficient again after a two+ year break from instrument flying. But the DA-40 and John weren't available at the same time for a while, and I thought it might actually be fun to fly the old 172 — and remember or relearn how to program the KLN 94 GPS or use an old-style heading indicator (HI) or an ADF. So I arranged things for today, and — as usual — set myself some easy targets. If I can get through the flight without upsetting the plane or making too many egregious mistakes, I'll feel confident enough to start working on the formal instrument proficiency check (IPC) that I need to get IFR current again.

This is actually the first non-G1000 (i.e. non-glass) panel I've flown PIC in (I think) more than seven years. It's also the first time I've flown a C172 in more than two years, and the first attempt at IFR since around that time as well. At least I have Foreflight on my iPad with me as a safety blanket. And the panel's not quite as bare as the one I started with all those billions of years ago, even if it does still look a little, uh, Twentieth Century.

* * *

Right from the start, this flight's just one damn thing after another, in so many unexpected ways. I'm not talking about the actual flying (more of which later), but about the broken nav light I find on pre-flight (meaning we have to be back earlier than I'd like), or the paper oil funnel that I lose in the cowl necessitating some deft work by John to retrieve it, or the way my headset starts a high-pitched screeching oscillation as we taxi to the runway (meaning I have to dig out a rarely-used second pair from my flight bag), or the total pilot-side audio system failure at the start of the LDA RWY 19R approach into Concord (basically meaning John has to handle the radios from that point on as I get plugged into the rear passenger intercom without PTT), or the ADF that doesn't actually work properly, or the … well, I'll stop there, because I'm making it sound like some sort of trial or annoying chore. It wasn't — this was actually a really enjoyable flight, and although I'll probably never fly this particular aircraft IFR (except maybe to get through a thin benign summer stratus layer back into Hayward or something), it's definitely fun to sit in the left seat of a 172 again and play old-time Real IFR pilot.

Predictably, my instruments skills are rusty, my instrument flying rough. The first time around the practice LDA 19R into Concord (with full pilot nav) is an endless procession of missed cues and my looking blankly at the KLN 94 GPS wondering how the hell I should set it up for the procedure turn or the next leg, etc. And I'm not even under the Cone Of Stupidity for this first time around — and I'm using the autopilot, for at least some of the way (before I ditch it and hand-fly for the rest of the flight — much more satisfying).

And when I do go under the hood, while my actual flying isn't terrible, it's hardly going to impress anyone. What does make me feel good, though, is just how quickly I internalize what the tiny attitude indicator (AI) and other instruments are telling me when I'm under the hood — I think that was my biggest worry, steam gauges or not, but it turns out it's not much of a problem at all. I feel gratifyingly comfortable mentally integrating all the needles, planes, and numbers the entire flight in ways that are simultaneously quite different from my way of working with the G1000 in detail but fundamentally the same with the big (mental) picture. Probably the thing that most flummoxes me during the flight is the inscrutable interface on the KLN 94 (an interface I once actually knew really well); I basically have to get John to prompt me every time I reprogram it or set it up for another approach. I have a few blank moments with the simple OBS as well — mostly, though, to do with how it relates to the KLN 94 rather than what it's telling me or how it works in general. So I start feeling good about things, despite the roughness and puzzled moments.

I manage to blot my copybook, though, with one monumental blunder — on the start of the circle-to-32R maneuver at 700' I confuse Concord's runway 01L with the intended landing runway 32R, which is something I haven't done since my student days, I think. I'd probably have caught it fairly quickly and not caused some sort of international incident (I always check with the HI), but it was still a sobering thing to do. Thank god John caught the error early on and I could get away with a normal landing on the correct runway as though I knew what I was really doing. The landing (a touch and go) itself was also pretty rough — all that time away from the 172 is definitely showing.

The second time around the LDA 19R approach — this time entirely under the hood and hand-flown — is smoother and better-executed, but still not precise or particularly inspiring; John still has to quietly prompt me here and there. And I'm definitely helped by having John have to do the radios for me; I'd probably be flying a lot worse without that help. And I've intermittently got the old death grip again on the yoke, something I thought I'd been cured of years ago. But as I tell John, at least I haven't killed anyone (yet), and it's definitely turning into a really enjoyable flight.

We go missed again at Concord and head south for the ILS 28R into Oakland (KOAK), an approach I think I've said a million times that I could probably do in my sleep. But I'm actually wide awake right now, and I wonder how this one's going to turn out — it's one thing to be able to remember all the fixes and waypoints off the top of your head (and I can), it's another to be able to dredge up the muscle memories that let you make those small smooth adjustments on the way down the glideslope to keep you falling off the localiser. We shall see.

As we're heading towards the ILS with NorCal Approach, John makes gentle fun of my accent and then admits he can't do an Australian accent to save himself. I taunt him with the observation that my first instructor Dave Montoya (RIP) could do a wicked good imitation of my accent, especially on-air, and that in any case, I don't really have an Australian accent any more — it's actually always been some sort of weird Anglo-Australian, and really never was truly Australian (I have three nationalities, and was born in in a country that really doesn't exist any more). John tries a few phrases, but he'll need a lot of coaching before he'll pass as an Aussie; I suspect it's easier for me to get IFR current and proficient again than John learning my accent. I'll do the funny accents on this flight if he'll do the radios, I guess.

The ILS goes surprisingly well — John gets me to fly the AI so that the top of the AI plane's wings are just touching the bottom of the horizon bars, which works wonderfully — and I nail the approach, looking up at about 500' feeling pretty good at seeing the runway dead ahead. Woohoo!

We go missed (well, you don't really go missed at Oakland, you just terminate the approach) and depart for Hayward, where I (finally!) land smoothly and gracefully. Mission accomplished, I think.

* * *

So how serious am I about getting IFR-current and proficient again? Fairly serious, is probably the best answer — I definitely miss the challenges and fun of doing approaches, and the ability to get back in when the nearly omnipresent stratus layer comes in over Hayward or Oakland in the non-winter, but the cost of staying current can still be prohibitive. I'll probably book another instrument flight with John fairly soon, this time in the DA-40 (or some sort of G1000-equipped airplane), and if that also goes well, I'll try a full instrument proficiency check with him after that.

We shall see, as I always say.

Night Flight

I carefully clear the airspace and start a steep(ish) 360 in the night sky somewhere west of Concord (KCCR) at 4,500', and one quadrant of the cockpit canopy fills with the lights on the ground. It's a great sight, and around we go. After rolling out on the 360 mark I hand JT the controls again, and tell her to try it herself this time. And so she does — she steers us around in her own 360, much shallower than mine, but pretty damn good for someone who's never been in a small GA plane before. She's already spent the past ten minutes flying us here from a few miles out of Livermore (KLVK) under my supervision, and she's kept us right-side-up and pretty much within a hundred feet of the target altitude all that time. I'm impressed; and she seems to be enjoying it a lot. As always with newcomers to small-plane GA flying, I'm really most relieved that she's not screaming "we're all going to die!!" or something while curled up on the floor. No one's ever done that yet, but that possibility is something I always keep in mind when I size someone up before taking them flying. I guess we've both passed this test.

* * *

JT's yet another acquaintance of mine willing to brave a flight with me, and here she is, climbing into the club's DA-40 with me on a cool October evening for a night VFR flight to Livermore for a bit of landing practice (my landings, that is, not JT's...) and then up to San Pablo Bay and back down the line of the hills to Hayward. I'd originally planned this flight for yesterday evening, and on my own, but someone (I know who you are!! :-)) forgot to leave the DA-40's keys and paperwork in the after-hours dropbox and I couldn't fly. And then on a moment's notice it turns out that JT would like to come along, and since these sorts of flights are always much more enjoyable with someone who actually likes flying coming along with you, I jumped at the chance, and rebooked for this evening. And so here we are….

After the impromptu 360's we fly on up and out over a dark-looking San Pablo Bay and back down over Richmond, Berkeley, and Oakland to Hayward (KHWD), where we land in that video game way I love with night flying. It's a beautiful clear night, and the traffic is minimal, and (once again) it's a reminder of why I keep flying.

Because I Can

2,500' Over Oakland

A low-intensity solo local VFR flight… because I can. This should have been another flight with a friend, but he couldn't make it at the last moment, so why not just … fly? So I do, circumnavigating Mt Diablo, doing touch and goes at Livermore (KLVK), lazily sightseeing over the Diablo Valley, etc., all in perfect Bay Area spring VFR weather.

I've bought new headsets — Lightspeed Sierras — to replace my old Lightspeeds, and the new ones work nicely, after having wrestled with the odd settings on the audio panel which initially made me think the new Sierras were broken. Back when I had something to do with club aircraft maintenance, we used to joke that 90% of all pilot-initiated avionics-related squawks are ultimately caused by the pilot not understanding the audio panel, and this is nearly one of those (but I did understand the panel, and I did debug the problem, after first blaming the headsets :-)).

Early tomorrow I'll resume my more usual position somewhere in the passenger cabin of a Southwest 737 bound for Burbank (KBUR). Not quite the same thing, really.

Taking a Six Year Old Flying

(The latest pic in a certain theme...)

I haven't taken my little nephew Alex flying since he was nearly four, and now he's six and a half (going on seven), and he's been bugging me about it for a year. So here we are, on Hayward's Green Ramp, pre-flighting 2MA, CalAir's DA-40 in bright morning sunshine. I had to cancel this flight a few weeks ago due to rain, but this time the weather's perfect. I get Alex to help with the pre-flight — moving the chocks, unchaining the wings, etc., while he watches business jets, little Cessnas, a helicopter, etc., taxi around us or take off and land. He asks all sorts of questions about ... well, everything... of course, and I can't always answer them, but he learns what each bit of the plane is called, and how to drain and check the fuel sumps. He won't remember it all, but it's a start, I guess. He particularly likes the way 2MA looks — it has the sort of sleek modern style that seven-year(ish) old boys think is cool — more so than the C172 which he in flew last time, anyway.

We climb in — Alex's mother Annette sits in the right front seat — and close the bubble (as Alex calls it). Alex loves his headset (which he's been wearing continuously since we finished the pre-flight) and I thank god that the back seats have no push-to-talk (he's not exactly the most taciturn of kids). We start up and I tell Ground we'll be doing the VFR Bay Tour transitioning through Oakland Tower's airspace, then taxi to 28L (I chose this runway rather than the smaller and closer 28R because I want Alex to see a big runway from the ground). I get a running "are we taking off yet? are we taking off yet?" from the back seat, which is pretty funny, especially when I have to patiently explain things like taxiing and the runup (I'm such a killjoy). I keep wondering when he's going to ask where the triggers are; sure enough, he points to the red autopilot disengage button on the stick and asks whether that's for the missiles. I wish, is all I say.

After a successful runup we taxi forward to the hold short line at Alpha, then get cleared for the usual takeoff and departure towards Lake Chabot below the Oakland Class C. And off we go... with Alex sitting quietly in the back as instructed, looking out intently at the world going by. We get handed off to Oakland Tower, then do the 880 transition up to the Bay Bridge, passing Alameda (where Alex lives) and Jingletown (where I live) to our left. Annette points out Alex's school for him, and he spots the various bridges across the Estuary, and then the Bay Bridge. He keeps saying things like "Coooool!" or "that's FANTASTIC!!!", which (of course) makes it so enjoyable.




(I live in the industrial area at the bottom centre of the photo above; Alameda's the island just across the Estuary from where I live).

We fly past the Bay Bridge toll plaza then head for Alcatraz. I circle it at 2,500' so Alex can look at it; he said the other day he wanted to see a jail, so here it is. Sometime soon I guess we'll take him on a boat to see Alcatraz up close, but right now it's wreathed in a loose tongue of fog coming in from the Golden Gate — which itself is picture perfect, with the fog coming in from the Pacific and bright sunlight above it all. We head for the Golden Gate, circling it a couple of times in each direction for photos and to give Alex a good view.

(An accidentally arty pic of the Golden Gate today).

We go back down the shoreline in front of San Francisco, then head across to Angel Island, then across to San Pablo Bay, where we drop flight following. I have the idea that I'll do some very light maneuvers for Alex to see how he responds; he loves them of course, so the turns get tighter, which amuses him, but Annette — who gets queasy at even the slightest bump — doesn't look so happy, so we return to normal level flying and head towards Concord, then along the Diablo Valley to Livermore. Alex recently went camping on Mt Diablo, and thinks it's really cool to see it from 3,000' up. On the way along the valley I do a series of little pull-up / pull-down maneuvers for Alex, which he later says was the high point of the flight, but Annette isn't so happy. Later, she sends me a short video she took on her iPhone of Alex reacting to the maneuvers — he's giggling ecstatically.

I was originally planning on doing a full stop landing at Livermore, and getting out to stretch our legs, but I suspect Alex would find touch-and-goes more exciting, so I call up Livermore Tower and ask for touch and goes. We get right traffic for 25R, and in what becomes a bit of an unintentional running gag, the controller promotes us to a Diamond Twin, then misunderstands my correction, meaning that for the entire time we're in the pattern, either we're a Diamond Twin, or she has our call sign one digit off (occasionally both). After about the third correction I just go with the flow — the controller's otherwise very competent and friendly, and who cares that we're missing an engine?! I keep waiting for a snarky comment on air about that missing engine, but everyone keeps it to themselves, I guess. It's predictably quite busy at Livermore, and we quickly get switched to 25L, which is a much smaller runway, and have our downwind extended a couple of times. Alex says he thinks the runway looks too small, but when we do the touch and goes, he's thrilled by the whole thing.

After the third touch and go (and to Annette's immense relief, I suspect), we head off back over the hills to Hayward. On call up to Hayward Tower, I'm amused that we still get asked to report "Cal State Hayward" when it's been "Cal State East Bay" now for years, and when the main landmark CSEB building was demolished a while back, and if you're not a local you probably have no idea where CSEB is otherwise, but never mind (it'll always be CSH for many of us locals anyway).

We land on 28R, taxi back to the Green Ramp, and tie the plane down. It's been a fun morning, and I suspect that the next time I take him flying, Alex will be sitting in the front seat. We shall see....

Fred, Flying

Fred's a colleague of mine, and has put up with enough of my stories at work about flying to call my bluff and ask me for a flight sometime. So here we are at Hayward (KHWD), taking the California Airways DA-40 for a nice VFR Bay Tour. The weather's perfect (creepily so, given the drought here in California), and, really, there's not much to say about the resulting 90 minute flight around the Golden Gate, Angel Island, San Francisco's Fishermans Wharf (we both work across from Pier 39), the Marin Headlands, Richmond, Napa, Concord, and other places nearby except it was a pleasant return to VFR flying with a passenger who's not a pilot but keen about flying.

The only drama — and really, it wasn't very dramatic — came on returning back to Hayward from across the hills when someone spotted what looked like clothing on the threshold of runway 28L, which was closed for maybe ten minutes, meaning we had to do a bunch of maneuvers to let the planes originally cleared for 28L land in front of us on 28R (it happened just as we were cleared on right base for 28R). Fred was following along well enough on the radio to understand what was happening, which was impressive; we ended up on an extended downwind waiting for a Mooney to flash past us. Otherwise, a scenic but entirely undramatic flight with a couple of touch and goes at Napa to keep proficient.

I'd spent much of the day before the flight wondering if I'd get the details — fuel pumps, flap settings, prop settings, etc. — correct on my own, but in the end, the combination of the iPad checklist app and my own memory seems to have served me well. I know I keep saying this, but I should do this more often...

Back In The Comfy Chair

Once again I'm sitting in the California Airways Comfy Chair at Hayward (KWHD), answering John's questions and feeling a little... well, uncomfortable. How could I forget that detail? What does this question really mean? And so it goes — but this time it's for the club's DA-40 signoff, and this time it's actually pretty straightforward. I filled in the DA-40 fam sheet while down in LA over the last few days (I have a client in the Mid-Wilshire area, and I spend an inordinate amount of time at both Burbank and Oakland airports as a result; unfortunately, all the flying between those two airports is done on Southwest, not in the DA-40), and I didn't find it difficult — just incredibly tedious. Oh well — at least it's not a bundle of trick questions or anything, and if I can't work out how to answer all of those questions quickly or even by memory (in an emergency), I really shouldn't be flying this plane. After a fairly short session, John signs me off for the DA-40 without too much ribbing about my spelling mistakes and typos.

Theoretically, now that I'm signed off I could just wander out on to the ramp and fly away in the DA-40 on my own, but I have other things in mind. In particular, I want to drag John along to help me tighten up power setting / throttle management on approach, landing, and takeoff (it was pretty rough and abrupt last time), and I want to try a practice approach somewhere to remind me what IFR flying is like, and to set the stage for further work in reclaiming IFR proficiency sometime in the new year (maybe). So we drive off to the Green Ramp, and twenty minutes later we're sitting off runway 28L, waiting for take off. The plan is to do the left 270 departure off towards SALAD intersection, while contacting NorCal Approach near the Hills for the practice RWY 28L LOC/DME approach back in to Hayward. I tell John I'll do the approach without wearing The Cone Of Stupidity (a.k.a. "The Hood"), mainly because I think I'll screw up enough of the approach after 16 months off without also worrying about keeping the plane right-side-up. Plus this is a Procedure Thing (a.k.a. "taming the beast", where "the beast" is my old friend the G1000, a system I really like a lot, but that does have its idiosyncrasies) — or at least that's what I tell myself.

Hayward Tower dumps us over Castro Valley, and I call up NorCal, who sounds really busy today. Luckily, I don't stumble too badly asking for the approach, but I do feel really rusty. The controller gives us a heading of 90 degrees for sequencing, and I struggle to remember how to set up both Foreflight and the G1000 properly for the approach. With some hints from John, I finally get the approach set up, and it's only then that I realise I just didn't study or prep properly for this — too much effort into getting the sign-off, too little into actually looking over the approach plate(s). I could probably still do the Oakland ILS and / or RNAV approaches in my sleep, but I haven't done IFR into Hayward in many many years, and it shows. I don't even know the names of the important waypoints or fixes, let alone the associated altitudes. Oh well — that's why John's along.

A lot of it does come back pretty quickly — the noting of crossing or minimum altitudes, intersection names and distances, and the missed approach procedures, but I still spend some time hitting the wrong buttons on the G1000, and my power and autopilot management skills definitely need more work. And I stumble on radio calls a bit more than I'd like (but at least I catch myself doing that). But it's an enjoyable experience, and as we get a couple of long vectors for traffic and then the localiser, it all sort of comes together in my mind. The controller's busy as hell, and there are several students on air doing approaches or whatever who are taking way more of his time than he'd clearly like, and it makes me wonder if we're about to blow through the localiser or hit the Fremont hills looming up ahead. But we get turned on to it in the nick of time (and the hills are actually below us, despite the way it looks from the cockpit), and I basically let the autopilot handle most of the horizontal tracking, while I watch with an eagle eye and set up the vertical bits. I can't help noting the autopilot's having trouble tracking the centerline at first, and wonder why out loud. John points to the crosswind display on the G1000 — there's something like 33 knot quartering headwind pushing us away. Looking out over the nose, I should have noticed — we're heading quite a way away from the airport (which I can see off in the distance) towards the hills, while tracking more-or-less correctly. A lot of the altitude management stuff comes back, with John's help, but I have so internalised the C172's settings, that I don't always do things as smoothly as I should. But, again, that's basically why John's here….

At minimums I dump the power, pull back, put in full flaps, and, a few seconds later, we're on the ground for a series of touch and goes in the pattern. As hoped, these end up tightening my control over the power settings and general flying, and a few times around the pattern later, I call it a day with another swooping left 270 to get us into the right traffic pattern for 28R (when the controller asks if we want the left 270 rather than going the long way around, I answer with something like "2MA, sure!", which surely isn't approved aviation speak, but I guess it did the job).

And once again, I don't have a suitable photo from today's flight, so here's one from my latest trip to LA — a sight I see pretty much weekly from the Southwest terminal at Burbank (KBUR). One day in the next six months I hope to fly the DA-40 there and back for business. We shall see….

The BFR

I still need to do my BFR (Biennial Flight Review) to get back into flying legally, so here I am in the California Airways office at Hayward Airport (KHWD) with John, sitting in the Comfy Chair being grilled on airspaces, VFR sectionals, and sundry other ... stuff ... to do with regulations and safe flying. John asks me what this particular airspace is, and I realise that while I know what it means (in this case, that 23 year old student pilots from Travis in giant C-17s will be under the hood in the vicinity of my little DA-40 or whatever, and that while I don't have to get permission to enter the airspace, keeping a good lookout might be appropriate),  I can't immediately remember what it's actually called (an Alert area). I quickly come to the conclusion that I still have an IFR pilot's view of airspace, which isn't all that helpful now that I'm likely to be mostly flying VFR. You fly IFR, and, to a first approximation, airspaces are the controller's problem; VFR, they're yours. It's kinda mortifying how poorly I remember some of this stuff.

On the other hand, I have done my homework (including a self-test worksheet from John), and most of the regulatory and other questions are not that hard, and much as I loathe the bad writing and inscrutable organisation of the FARs and the AIM, it's still light relief compared to some of the things I have to read or work on for a living as a techie. So the verbal bits go OK — John doesn't try to make the questions tricky, or ask about obscure regulations that would have no impact at all on a GA pilot like me — and we finish up after a little more than an hour, and decide to go flying. BFR part one, accomplished!

The agenda for the rest of the day was originally to get a club sign-off on the DA-40 as well as doing the BFR. Unfortunately, I haven't got the paperwork ready for the sign-off, so the focus today will be on the BFR only. I'll have to do the sign-off paperwork some other time -- I'd like to be able to rent the DA-40 on my own, as it's definitely a nice plane to fly.

This time things work really well with my iPad checklist, and that part goes OK, if slowly (I've internalised the complete pre-flight checklist for the 172s (including all thirteen fuel test points), but not the DA-40 yet). Once in the cockpit, I'm impressed at how well the new RAM mount for my new iPad Mini works (yes, I broke down and bought John's old iPad Mini after he got a new one). This time, the iPad just works, and throughout the flight it's a comfortable and useful addition to things. There's only one thing that irritates me — the Foreflight basic airport info should include pattern altitudes for each runway. Never mind, I'm sure I'll cope.

We depart VFR for Napa (KAPC), one of the most familiar non-Oakland non-Hayward airports in my life, and do the transition through Oakland Tower's airspace; we're then handed off to NorCal Approach. I haven't done this transition in years, and it probably shows — I pester John for hints on what happens next, and I'm not as immediately familiar with the various landmarks as I should be. Flying out of Oakland is definitely more straightforward, but then again, I can't rent a DA-40 there, can I? Hayward works fine if you can live with the little irritations of being a small Class D airspace airport wedged in under Oakland's busy Class C airspace (an airspace that extends to the ground only literally metres from the end of Hayward's runways and that gives you a 1,500' ceiling on departures that haven't been cleared into the Class C anywhere around the airport); Oakland's Class C is itself under San Francisco's Class B airspace, but that's less troublesome for departures towards Napa. Plus Hayward's a longer drive for me, but not significantly so (I could be like John and ride my bike, but I already ride my bike every day as part of getting to work, so sometimes I feel I need to exercise my car on drives like this).

So we potter off towards Napa, and NorCal gives us the frequency change about twelve miles out. I call Napa Tower and tell them we're inbound for touch and goes, and the controller responds with standard instructions for runway 6. This is a (somewhat) new one for both John and me — we both almost always get 18L or 18R, or 24. Woohoo! But I'm more interested in the controller's accent (being a funny-accented guy myself — I collect accents) and ask John what he thinks her accent is. Neither of us is sure, but John's probably right that it's very slightly Caribbean, maybe Guadalupe; in any case, it's pleasant and intrigues me the entire time we're at Napa.

The first touch and go at Napa is a fairly straightforward thing from a right base, and I don't break anything or kill anyone, even if I did come in like I was landing a bit short. There's really not much wind, but there's more traffic than I expect, with a constant (small) line of planes waiting to take off much of the time. Just as we're downwind abeam the tower for the second touch and go, tower clears me for another touch and go, with the short approach. Alllriiiighht! I think (I love these swooping approaches), and go ahead and try it. First lesson here: you can easily do a forward slip in the DA-40, and while it feels and looks dramatic from the left seat, it doesn't actually lose you much airspeed or altitude. Oh well. Again, I actually make it onto the ground and back up into the air without breaking anything (and only once, not repeatedly), but it wasn't as smooth or as professional-looking as I'd like.

The next few times around include a couple of power-off and no-flap approaches and landings, and, again, while they're nothing to write home about, they don't cause me to question my choice of ways to spend a Saturday afternoon (and what always feels like millions of dollars :-)). Despite the fact that I don't seem to have internalised the proper power settings for each part of the pattern, John seems satisfied, so we head back out over San Pablo Bay to do some airwork. The next fifteen minutes or so have me either repeatedly on the edge of a stall as I wander around the sky, or actually stalling, or doing steep turns (and definitely not stalling). I love this stuff, even if it's not the aerobatics I used to do, and even if we can't do spins. Again, although my flying is nowhere near as precise as I'd like (that word "agricultural" keeps popping into my head at times like this), John seems satisfied, and we head off back to Hayward.

We call up NorCal and tell them where we're going, and the rest of the flight — over Berkeley, over the Coliseum abeam Oakland (KOAK) and so on all the way to Hayward — is familiar territory and relatively easy. At one point as we're somewhere north of Berkeley I look west towards the Golden Gate, and, yes, it's Just Another Boring Bay Area Sunset out there. Hopefully fairly soon I'll start taking people up to see all this again....

I line up on final for Hayward's 28R... and promptly botch the landing. Well, as I seem to keep saying, I didn't kill anyone or break anything, but I was definitely a little slow, and while almost all my other landings were fairly smooth, this was not. Oh well. Must Do Better Next Time, as my old primary school teacher used to say. We taxi to the Green Ramp, tidy up, tie down, order fuel, and drive back to CalAir. On the short drive back I can't help noticing just how well-maintained Hayward Airport is compared to Oakland Airport nowadays — there may be fewer planes on the Green Ramp, but there's a waiting list for hangars, and those hangars, and the taxiways, the ramp and runway surfaces, the buildings, the lighting, etc., all feel both more modern and just plain newer than the Oakland equivalents (except, of course, Hayward's classic old tower). We discuss the different business approaches the Port of Oakland and the City of Hayward take to the respective airports — it's striking how much more care Hayward seems to put into the GA side of things. It's no secret that Oakland's not thrilled by the small GA side of its operations, but coming back to Hayward made it even more obvious. Not sure what it all means for flying out of Oakland, but we'll see....

Back at CalAir we do the debriefing — yes, John's signing me off for the BFR — and decide on next moves. I still need to get signed off on the DA-40, so hopefully next weekend I can get that out of the way and start flying out of Hayward again.

I wish I had some photos from the flight, but, hey, my little iPhone doesn't always come up to scratch for things like this, so what you see up there is a typically pastoral scene from my neighbourhood instead. Sorry.

Back In The Saddle

I drive to California Airways at Hayward (KHWD), not really sure what’s going to happen, but curious and not particularly worried about much. I haven't flown with CalAir for years, and this is my first flight PIC from anywhere since August last year, and I'm wondering whether I should be getting back into flying — almost all the things that were true when I announced I was going to take a break are still true, and it's going to be a long and difficult-to-schedule return to regular GA flying, if I make it at all. And while I renewed my medical and KOAK ramp badge, I'm way out of currency with almost everything, and need to do a BFR.

It starts well when I walk up to the CalAir office and there’s Keith, playing a fighter pilot shoot-em-up on a large screen overlooking the runway. He looks up at me, grins, and says “Well, well, well — look who the cat dragged in!” We talk a bit about the TSA, Hayward Airport's (non-) security, and how GA’s dying — pretty much the same things we talked about the last time I saw him, all those years ago. It's good to see him again. The office is buzzing with students and instructors, which is always a good sign.

John and I sit down and discuss the flight — what's the aim, what's the agenda? I still haven't even started my BFR, so that's a possibility, but really, for me, it's mostly just about getting back into flying after a 16 month absence, and becoming familiar with a new plane, the Diamond DA-40, a type of plane I've never even seen before as far as I know. If I can still take off, land, and do basic airwork without major issues in a plane I've never seen before, I'll be pleased; I'm really not that fussed yet about the BFR. Aim low, I tell John. He seems amused by this dedication to underachievement, and we decide we'll just head for the Diablo practice area and do a bit of airwork and see what happens. It's a hazy day in the Bay Area, and it's even hazier out in the Valley, with Livermore (KLVK) reporting three miles visibility, which makes me a little cautious.

John spends some time prepping me for the DA-40 — some idiosyncrasies in the controls, the G1000 (which I remember well), the V speeds, the best way to approach and land, etc. — and then there's a bit of paperwork (bringing my club records up to date mostly), and then we’re ready for the plane. At the old CalAir location, you simply walked out of the building onto the ramp, but the new location’s at the eastern end of the airport on Hesperian, and we have to drive to the Green Ramp near the tower up towards the other (western) end of the airport. As an Oaklander normally based at KOAK, with its high security and all, I sort of expect to drive up Hesperian, park in the parking lot under the Tower, then walk on to the ramp, but this is Hayward — we just drive through the gate onto the ramp (there's a combination lock there), then drive up the marked vehicle access “road” on the tarmac on the north side of the airport to the Green Ramp, and park right near the plane. Cool! The Green Ramp looks almost deserted, which is not a good sign, especially since when I last flew out of Hayward, it looked difficult to get a space there.

The plane’s pretty much what I expected — sleek, relatively modern-looking (at least compared to a 172), and in good condition. We spend maybe twenty minutes doing a thorough pre-flight, using John's iPhone checklist app and his DA-40 specific checklist (we tried getting it to work on my iPad checklist app, but it didn't take, for some reason), and there’s nothing much to report about this except it all made sense and there’s really nothing unfamiliar or surprising about the mechanical bits. One of the news helicopters lined up next to taxiway Alpha a hundred metres away starts up and flies off, and three or four shiny business jets taxi past interspersed with a handful of smaller 172s. The noise is at times too loud for talking, but I'm not complaining — it's a welcome, very familiar background chorus.

We get in, which is a little difficult the first time — the canopy is large, and it should be easy, but it isn't, for some reason, possibly due to the need to drop in rather than climb in. I don't know. Once in, I have to adjust the rudder pedals rather than the seat — the seat's fixed, and at first this feels weird — there are simply no adjustments at all for the seat, meaning it's basically a like it or lump it thing. I'm not sure I like it at first, but we'll see. The first problem is immediately obvious: my old iPad 3 won't easily fit on my thigh (like it did with the 172) because the DA-40 uses a stick; the iPad just gets in the way, much more than I'd expected. This is actually something of a long-term show-stopper — I have to rely on John's iPad mini as held and manipulated by him — but with the G1000, at least, for VFR it's no big deal, just annoying. The good news? My old Lightspeed headset still works. Battered, clunky, bulky, and outdated, but still usable.

I follow the checklist for startup, and it starts first time, which always seems to be a bit of an accomplishment with fuel-injected GA engines like this; I feel gratified. The engine controls (prop, throttle, mixture, etc.) feel familiar — I have a complex endorsement, some time in complex aircraft, and the G1000 really makes this sort of thing easy to monitor and control. We go through the checklist again, then I call Ground. The second issue… argh! The call sign is weirdly difficult to say (some just are, for pilots and controllers alike; the AAC's old (and long-gone) N5445H was the worst I've had to use), and it'll take a long while to get used to saying — and hearing — “Diamond Star …” rather then “Cessna …”. Oh well.

We request a right crosswind departure from 28L and get taxi clearance. I do the runup in the runup area — nothing weird or unusual about this, either — then we saunter up to 28L at Alpha. I call tower, and get told initially to hold short for traffic in the pattern (a 172 I can see on downwind for 28L), then get a quick “2 mike alpha, cleared for immediate take off runway 28L, traffic's on left downwind, right crosswind departure approved” (or something like that). I get the hint, and we do a fast arcing turn onto the centreline, and start the takeoff run. The DA-40 has a castoring nose wheel, with little rudder authority below about 30 knots, so you have to use differential braking on the ground for most turns; this can be an issue for the first few hundred metres of the takeoff roll, as you really don't want to use braking to maintain directional stability as you're trying to accelerate, but what else is there? I'm familiar with this from both the Tiger and the Cirrus, but it's still a bit annoying, especially on narrower runways. Still, we survive, and I rotate at Vr — or, rather, the plane lifts off with little input from me on this, before I'd even started to pull back on the stick. Flaps up and fuel pump off on initial climb out, then a quick right turn to heading 030, then we're on our way. Pull the prop back to 2400, keep the throttle full forward (this plane is fine running continuously oversquare), and we climb quickly — we have a 1400' ceiling here below Oakland's Class C airspace we can't break for several minutes, and I have to be very careful with this (I'm used to departing Oakland, where this isn't an issue as long as you stay out of the much higher KSFO Class B airspace, which is easy). The controls all feel absolutely fine to me — it's a nicely balanced plane, and nothing about stick or pedals feels weird or uncomfortable. But the climb out angle at Vy feels too high for me, and I drop the nose a bit so I can see better.

Once past the edge of the Class C we climb towards 3,500 and head out over the hills. For the first time I can see the Diablo Valley, and it's really hazy. I tell John I'm not sure I'm comfortable with doing airwork out there — the visibility is MVFR at best, and I'd like to be able to actually see other planes while doing steep turns, etc. John's OK with that, and suggests we circumnavigate Mt Diablo, which I'm up for. I quickly get a feel for the trim on this plane — a lot more sensitive than the 172, but easily usable, and within a few minutes I'm very comfortable with the way it all handles. As John says, there's a nice harmony between aileron and elevator controls, and the engine's efficient and effective. After leveling off and proper trimming and leaning, we're doing (from memory) 135 KIAS on 75% power at 9.5 GPH, which is considerably better than a 172. I engage the autopilot (a bog-standard KAP 140, something I could probably use with my eyes closed), and we start around Mt Diablo. The view from up here is hazy, wintry, beautiful, almost monochromatic. On the far side, John asks if I'd like to go over to Rio Vista (O88) for landing practice. Of course! We set the GPS accordingly, and off we go. Ground visibility here is poor — a few miles — and the sight of the windfarm's windmills in the same nearly monochromatic soft Delta haze is other-worldly.

We can hear another plane in the pattern on CTAF, using runway 33; we want to use 25, and John carefully negotiates our way into this with the other pilot, who sounds a little grumpy at the intrusion (he leaves the pattern after our first landing, leaving us to ourselves for the rest of the exercise). Runway 25 is longer and wider than 33, and for my first few landings, makes a lot more sense — and, in any case, there really isn't a lot of wind in any direction on the ground (or at altitude) today (hence the haze). John does the first landing on 25, talking me through it, then hands the controls to me again on the upwind. The pattern is straightforward, and I do OK — flaps, prop, mixture, fuel pump, throttle, etc., and on final it all looks good. I realise once again — for probably the hundredth time in my flying life — that Rio Vista's 25 looks kinda narrow to this Big City Airport kinda guy. Luckily there's no significant crosswind, I guess. The first landing goes fine — this is not a plane you want to land in a full stall, unlike the 172, but that's no problem, and the sighting in my mind just works. This feels like it isn't going to be problematic, and it isn't — the rest of my landings here and back at Hayward are OK, perhaps a little agricultural sometimes, but the plane handles nicely, and while it's slippery and there's a lot of ground effect (the wings are quite a lot longer and thinner than a 172's), that's not a big problem if you think your way through it and hold off all the small adjustments you'd probably make in a 172. Again, the mental visualisation for landing this plane seems particularly easy, and while the differential steering thing could be annoying on rollout, it's not much of an issue for touch and goes.

We do a handful of landings and pattern work, then depart straight out for Hayward. John calls Travis Approach for flight following back (I was about to do it myself, especially given the haze — I'm not one of those nutters who eschews ATC contact just because ATC is The Government or because they cherish “freedom”). The flight back to Hayward is uneventful, and, as suspected, it's a bit difficult to get back into Hayward itself without GPS — the haze and the glare is pretty bad. The conditions are a lot like my PP-ASEL checkride with Larry Peters, where I decided to use the ILS to get back to Oakland from several miles out (Mr. Peters was impressed and pleased by this, but what the hell else could I do safely?). We land back on 28R, and taxi to the Green Ramp. I feel pleased to have done it all without killing or scaring anyone, and with minimal clobbering around the head from John. The plane feels good, the flying was fun, and it was weirdly easy to land and handle the plane after all this time off — and in an unfamiliar cockpit. John seems fairly pleased as well.

* * *

While prepping for the flight last night, I go through my old flight bag, trying to sort out the useless crap from the more useful crap (and occasional non crap). It's an odd experience. It contains the collected detritus and paraphernalia of nearly fifteen years of flying, spanning simple pilotage-based VFR through steam-gauge era IFR to complex GPS and autopilot IFR (with side jaunts for things like aerobatics). The biggest change is that I've simply junked my old paper backups — I was already using my iPad for charts and approach plates before the break, but I kept the old paper stuff around just in case. That doesn't make much sense any more, and in any case I stopped my paper subs a year ago, sort of forcing the issue. My ForeFlight app has been at the centre of my flying since it first appeared (I was a very early adopter, actually quoted on their website in the early days), but its role has changed from just weather and info to charts, plates, briefings, filings, etc.; now it's difficult to imagine being without it, IFR or VFR. The result of all this is that my gear now fits in my normal backpack; I'm no longer carrying around a heavy black flight bag. I stand there thinking: will this all work? I don't know — I feel rusty at everything, especially packing for a VFR local flight.

And I probably need a new headset if I'm going to take this seriously again. Not cheap.

* * *

So will I keep flying? Will I do my BFR anytime in the next few months? The simple answer is: I don't know. This was a fun and morale-boosting flight, but as I said earlier, all the reasons I took a break are still valid (in some cases even more so — I work in LA a lot nowadays, which is a long commute). We shall see....

Hayward Airport Open House

Last Sunday (the 12th) I dragged my two young nephews (3 and 5) along with me to the 2012 Hayward Airport (KHWD) Open House just down the road from Oakland, a sunny, good-natured event attended by a lot of locals, an event I enjoyed a lot.

Although they only lasted about an hour, Alex and Simon really enjoyed clambering over and around the Coast Guard helicopter, watching the B17 taxiing and flying around, "driving" the fire engine, playing around the Grumman Albatross, waving at the P51 as it did repeated flyby's, and just generally wandering around looking at the planes (long-term readers will know that the older one's already flown with me in a 172 out of Oakland). The two Tuskegee Airmen I talked to at the TA stall were great too — hope I'm that sharp and drily funny when I'm their age...

A few random snaps from the day:



Aluminum Overcast



Little Simon, Big Albatross




Little (Loud) Albatross: an Aero Vodochody L-39




Two Tuskegee Airmen