A Plane He Built

Tales From the Right Seat of an Experimental Aircraft

[aplanehebuilt]

Mostly Delight

Headwinds

Late October, Breakfast, Hampton, South Carolina

I moved my hand away from the top of my mug and nodded to the waitress. “This coffee is wonderful,” I smiled.

“I’m glad y'all enjoy it,” she smiled back at me and filled my mug.

About an hour later, In the air over Fayetteville, North Carolina

There is a twenty knot headwind.

Another hour later, near the southern tip of the DelMarVa peninsula

There is a thirty knot headwind, and we are beginning to think about a fuel stop. 

 A half hour later, over the Atlantic Ocean

Roy and I were two thousand miles from home, in chairs in the sky, in a plane he built. This absolutely overwhelms me with delight. And the best part of the day is still to come.

For an added bonus, I could see many of the places that were navigation references used during my training for my Coast Guard Captain's License. The huge airports of Norfolk International and Oceana Naval Air Station were off to the west. I recognized the curve of the bay, and the bridges that become tunnels half way across the bay. And there was the ocean, endless water and whitecaps moving across the bay.

Roy pushed the throttle in and started to climb over a thin layer of puffy, white clouds.

I reached for his hand… “I seriously have to pee…” I said. The coffee from breakfast - the wonderful dark brew that I couldn’t resist have three cups of -had hit bottom.

“Now?”

“Yes, now.” I squirmed in my seat and reached for the iPad, opened Foreflight and started looking for places to land.

“There’s an airfield,” I pointed ahead and to the left. Sun shone on broad, flat farms below us. White barns and a few houses dotted green farms, green crops, blue ponds, and blue estuaries winding in from the sea.

“That airport is off our beam now.” I wasn’t sure he’d heard me.

“I wished you’d told me before I started to climb.” He sounded annoyed. He poked at the AFS screen in front of him. “Can you wait?”

“No,” I shook my head. “You said we could stop.” I could hear the petulance in my voice.

He pulled the throttle back and pointed the nose down.

“What was wrong with…?” I pointed back over my shoulder. No point now. We were making for a different airport.

“I want to get fuel closer to Dover.” He held up his finger for ‘sterile cockpit’.

Our little plane bumped and rocked side to side in the turbulent cross-wind as we made our final approach. I held my legs tight. Please don’t pee in the plane, please don’t pee in the plane… The words ran in my brain like a rosary. Large, black crows scattered from the runway as we approached the numbers. I didn’t care about the birds. I did care about sitting in a wet spot.

I held my breath, then exhaled as we touched down.

Roy taxied to the fuel pump, shut the engine down, and cracked the canopy. I popped out without our usual landing-kiss. There wasn’t a soul around. The FBO was locked. I ran around to the other side. No door there. I ran back to the other door and banged on it. Nothing. No One. I ran around to the back of the building. Really, there was no back. Just the taxiway, and the runway, and beyond that farm land.

Isn’t airplane travel glamorous, I thought.

I hiked up my jeans and walked back to the plane. Roy was walking to the FBO.

“It’s locked,” I nodded my head toward the building. “Did you get fuel?”

He shook his head. “Fuel pump’s locked too.”

“How long to Dover?” I think in terms of time to destination, which has to do with the best part of the day being just ahead. For this, I’m willing to deal with the occasional abandoned FBO. 

“About 470 nautical miles.” Roy thinks in terms of range, which has to do with if we’ll have the required minimum fuel when we get to Dover.

Late October, In the late afternoon of the day we began in Savanna, Georgia

This time I gave my darling husband a landing-kiss before popping out of the plane.  The Best Part of the Day had arrived. 

I ran through the terminal to the parking lot. My daughter was there, with her head in the backseat. She looked up and smiled. A little brown-haired girl next to her turned to see what her Mom was looking at.

“Grandma!” Ava, otherwise known as Gramma’s Princess, ran and jumped into my arms. I held her and planted kisses all over her face. My daughter, Gaela, held baby Logan in her arms. I put Ava down and hugged my daughter. “Hi Mom,” she said, and baby Logan smiled from her arms. And that, simply overwhelms me with delight.

[aplanehebuilt]

Delight and Discomfort

COFFEE

Late October, Before Dawn, In the Kitchen of Roy’s cousin Nancy

Nancy place a togo cup in the Keurig Machine. “Listen,” she said. “The machine isn’t done until it says Sorry.” The coffee machine gurgled, poured a stream of black brew, then exhaled Sooorrrrreeee. “Here you go,” she put a lid on the cup and handed it to me. Her husband Craig stood in the doorway dressed for work. “Ready?” He asked. I gave Nancy a hug. “I can hardly wait to see you again.” She hugged me back.

Sunrise, The Savanna Airport

“Would you like a ride to your plane?” The line guy loaded our duffles, black computer bag, small day-pack and my yoga matt into the golf cart before I could answer.

We zoomed over the concrete, past luxury jets of various sizes. The line guy watched as I opened the canopy and climbed on the wing. “I love this time of day,” he said. He had a close shaved head and clear brown eyes.

I stuffed the computer bag in the baggage compartment, then sat up and followed the direction of his gaze. The sun was sliding brilliant orange over the horizon. Deciduous trees around the airport reflected the light in reds and golds. The wind sock across the runway stood at attention.

“The other fellas think I’m crazy,” he said, “but I always ask for this `shift.”

I nodded. “I can see why.”

An hour later, 3J0, Hampton, South Carolina

“Ya’ll want toast or biscuits?” the waitress asked. She was plump, and wore a faded pick T-shirt. The Hampton House had booths with vinyl seats along the window wall and a long counter on the inside. Pots clanged in the kitchen behind the wall in back of the counter. The flooring in front of the counter showed layers of red and dark green worn linoleum, where years of shoes had walked by to pick up their order or pay the bill.

“Toast, please,” I replied. 

“Sure thing, Honey.” The waitress filled my mug with black brew, flipped her order pad closed, and disappeared into the kitchen. Two heavy-set fellas in the booth next to ours spoke in thick southern accents.

“Do you understand them?” Roy whispered across the table.

I shook my head. “Not a single word.” My darling hubby is from Tennessee, and if he can’t understand the conversation, you know the accent is thick. My people hail from Arkansas. I can usually decipher, if he is unable. Not so in this case.

Roy nodded. “Different country.”

“We are awfully far from home,” I replied.

The waitress returned with our food. My plate was piled with two eggs, fried in butter, crispy around the edges, and buttery, hot grits. This tickled me with delight, as if my Gramma was taking a vacation from heaven and made me breakfast. Any five-star hoidy-toidy Sunday buffet with custom omelettes doesn’t hold a candle to my Gramma’s fried eggs and grits.

“This breakfast is totally worth getting up at the crack of dawn and getting in the airplane for,” I grinned over a mouthful of grits.

Roy broke open a flaky biscuit and smiled. He knows I’m not a morning person.

“Want a top-off?” The waitress asked. I nodded. The coffee was wonderful too.

I dispatched breakfast, and the second cup of coffee. The waitress came by with the pot again. I held my hand over my mug. “The coffee is so good, but I shouldn’t.”

“It’s okay,” Roy said, “we can stop.”

“How long is it to Dover?” I think in terms of time to destination, which has to do with how soon until I need to get empty.

“About 470 nautical miles.” Roy thinks in terms of distance and range, which has to do with how soon the plane needs to be filled. “It’s okay. We can stop,” he repeated.  

Honest to god’s truth, that is how I remember it.

I moved my hand away from the top of my mug and nodded to the waitress. “This coffee is wonderful,” I smiled. It’ll be worth a little discomfort, I thought, and anyway, the best part of this day is yet to come.

“I’m glad y'all enjoy it,” she smiled back at me and filled my mug.

One hour later, Near Fayetteville, North Carolina

There is a twenty knot headwind. We have plenty of fuel, and the best part of the day is yet to come.

Two hours later, near the Cape Charles VOR, Southern tip of the DelMarVa peninsula

There is a thirty knot headwind. We have plenty of fuel, and the best part of the day is yet to come.

To be continued...

[aplanehebuilt]

My Fear is Not the Boss of Me

I clenched my eyes against a wave of vertigo. It was solid gray outside the plane. No ground and no sky, only the wing of our plane, silver against the gray. I opened my eyes and studied the instruments in front of me. The altimeter read five thousand feet.  

“How are you doing?” Roy rubbed his shoulder against mine. His red hoodie rolled against my fleece jacket.

“Fine,” I nodded. Of course I’m fine, I thought. We’re in an aluminum thing built in our hangar, in the clouds, over the mountains. Why wouldn’t I be fine?

I closed my eyes again, placed my palms on my knees and whispered a mantra from the science fiction story, Dune.

I will not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. I will face my fear. I will let it pass over me and through me, and when it is passed, all that is left is me.

I took a deep breath, exhaled and opened my eyes. The propeller spun in thin black lines that paused, turned backward, then forward again. The altimeter still read five thousand feet. The engine still thrummed. The little airplane symbol was still on the purple line on the Advanced Flight System (AFS) screen..

My fear goes everywhere with me. Most of the time it keeps me from doing obviously stupid things like taking my boat out in gale force winds.

I wrapped my hands around the soft, warm sheepskin shoulder straps. All that is left is me, and my fuzzies to hold on to.

The small, blue screen of the Avidyne below the radio stack flashed.

“Time to turn,” Roy said, and turned a knob on the AFS. The artificial horizon on the Dynon tilted, and the compass needle ticked past numbers. Our altitude was still five thousand feet. We were still on course. Still in the clouds. Still above the Smoky Mountains.

My fear would never miss a chance to natter on about how scary things are, so no way would it miss out on a flight like this.

Usually, my job is to enter and manage our route with the FMS. Instead, my fear was sitting in my lap, whining about how we were going to fall out of the sky. My fear was taking the place where my co-piloting could reside.

I nudged Roy and pointed at the Dynon. “It’s 3 degrees outside.” Water droplets formed on the wing. Filtered light gave way to dark, ominous gray. We were between layers of clouds that curved in long waves, like upside down turkey platters.

Roy nodded and dialed up weather information on the AFS. “Looks like it should clear soon,” he said.

“Lenticular clouds,” I blurted. My butt cheeks tightened in the seat. “That means unstable air.” My fear studied the temperature on the Dynon as if it were about to divulge the relationship between gravity and electromagnetism.

We popped out into gray light just long enough to see dark, rain sodden rolls of a cumulus formation. I shut my eyes tight, and shook my head. “I don’t want to go in that big ass cloud,” my fear announced.

Our plane bounced and yawed. I smelled exhaust and my own body odor, and the faint smell of Roy’s Irish Spring. The bouncing stopped and I opened my eyes. We were still in the clouds, but they were thinner. Our altitude was still five thousand feet. I pulled the iPad out of the side pocket and opened the Avidyne app. Our compass heading matched our flight-plan trajectory. I looked at the chart on the AFS. We were well above any mountains. The radar overlay showed we were on the edge of the weather system.

I looked out the canopy and spotted ground through wet blankets of gray.

Roy reached for my hand. “Okay now?” He asked.

“Yes,” I brushed my fingers across the stubble on his cheek. I knew he’d shave it off after we arrived at his cousins home in Savanna, and I knew I’d miss it. “I’m okay,” I said. And suddenly, in saying the words, I knew I was.

Long, white chicken houses rolled by below, and homes, and barns in folds of the mountains. The trees distinguished themselves in stands of red and gold maple and green pine.

It felt like we were sinking. “We’re still at five thousand feet, right?” I pointed to the altimeter.

“That’s MSL,” Roy replied. “We’re three thousand...”

The radio interrupted his reply. “174RT,” the Controllers voice said, “Climb to 5,500 for terrain.”

My fear had nothing to say about this.

The clouds thinned. Entire farms we visible, then roads and town. Suddenly, the mountains fell away to a broad, delta and the clouds dissipated. The ground was flat and wet and green. Small, wispy clouds passed over our wing and canopy.  My fear was still with me, but it was somewhere in the baggage compartment, with the wet socks, where it couldn’t prevent me from thinking.

The long, black rectangle of the Savanna, Georgia runway sat in the middle of the delta.

“Savanna Approach, Experimental 174RT” Roy said into the radio, “We have the runway in sight.”

“174RT,” The controller replied, “You’re number three for the runway. Clear to land.”

Number three? I thought. “Where’s our traffic?” 

Roy pointed out the canopy. Two Delta Airlines jets were at our ten O’clock and twelve o’clock.

“Caution wake turbulence,” I said and laughed. Roy turned and grinned at me, then raised his finger in the “quite please” gesture.

Later, I stood in the posh reception area of the Savanna FBO, my hands wrapped around a steaming mug of hot chocolate, and watched a large jet being towed past the picture windows. Our plane was out on the tie-downs, a miniature next to the private flying limousines. I felt very small, very human, and very alive.

[aplanehebuilt]

Ripping Off The Bandaid

The windsock was standing straight at attention when we drove out to the plane. I felt like I was hit by an 18-wheeler of frozen air when I stepped out of the car. Roy was already at the fuel pump, his shoulders hunched against the cold as he opened the fuel caps.

We could have stayed at Marvin and Sandy’s till the weather cleared, But no... I’d rushed us out, away from their Avaitors Dream Home, away from crackling fireplace, away from the view of the mountains, away from the Smokies. I enjoyed visiting with Marvin and Sandy, and I didn’t want to leave, but we were due in Savanna, Georgia that afternoon. 

“We have an hour drive to the airport,” I’d said, “and we need to return our rental car.”

A muddy hiking boot fell on my foot when I opened the trunk of the car. Our gear smelled of decaying leaves and mud and rain. My other hiking boot was caked with mud, and stuffed under our blue, nylon laundry bag. Our wadded up rain ponchos lay on top of the rumpled day-pack. A shopping bag with a puzzle I’d bought for my granddaughter at the Smoky Mountain National Park gift shop was stuffed to one side. I opened our small cooler to find stale remnants of turkey and cheese sandwiches.

Roy dipped his finger in the fuel tank, rubbed it around the fuel caps rubber seal, and pressed it back on the tank. “Would you like help packing the plane?”

And then, it started to rain. Or perhaps I started to cry. Maybe both. Cold wet drops rolled down my face. I picked up my hiking boot and pitched it back in the trunk.

I shook my head. “It doesn’t have to be organized,” I said. “it just has to fit.”

He shrugged and turned back to pre-flight inspection. He was smart to stand clear of the badger hole.

I turned to sorting and organizing. Each thing I put my hands on triggered a memory: My soft, fleece blanket that I wrapped around my legs while sat on the front porch of our cabin in a cane-back rocker, drinking coffee and listening to the creek spilling over stones. The walking stick I leaned on as I clambered over slippery rocks and roots, up the side of a mountain, and down again. My rain poncho, dripping with spray from a waterfall where I’d stood gaping, opened mouthed, under a brilliant kaleidoscope of trees.

I put my face in my hands. I wanted to stay, to call the Smoky Mountains home. But that wasn’t the choice we’d made. It was less than a year since we sold our house and set out to be voyagers, and here I was, ready to bag the plan and set up housekeeping. I stuffed our gear in the baggage compartment and retreated to the FBO to make lunch.

Roy walked in and a cold rush of air followed him.

I handed him a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. “We’re going to have to file,” I said. Clouds were breathing back and forth past a radio tower on a hillside across the runway.

He nodded. “Already done.”

“It’s going to be cold and wet up there.”

He nodded again.

I am terrified of flying in the clouds. All I had to say was I’m not comfortable with this, and we’d stay. But that would only delay the inevitable. It would be ripping the bandaid off slowly. Clouds or no, I needed leave. Or I’d never want to leave. I needed to get in the plane.

Two peanut butter sandwiches later, Roy and I were shoulder to shoulder in the plane. Our gear in the baggage space behind us still smelled of mud and wet socks.

I rolled the ear-buds of my CQ1 headset between my fingers, slid them in my ears, then pulled my red knit hat on. I said words of gratitude for a headset that allowed me the simple comfort of keeping my head warm.

I reached over to enter our flight plan on the Avidyne. My job is entering our route information and radio frequency. Roys’ job is flying the plane.

Roy pushed my hand away. “It’s a victor airway. I’ll show you later.”

While we were in the Smokies I’d promised to study our new Avidyne Flight Management System, and learn how to enter different types of flight plans. Instead, I’d filled my journal with the meanderings of my brain, gob-smacked by entire mountain-sides changing colors, and the sounds of my footsteps on Appalachian trails, and my fascination with the way my breath floated into the mist.

I turned away and pretended to study the light slanting through clouds and reflecting off the glass towers of downtown Knoxville.

“Knoxville Approach, Experimental 174RT. We’d like to active our flight plan.”

Nothing. No answer. Roy turned knobs on the radio.

“Knoxville Approach, Experimental 174RT.”

Still nothing. Still no answer.

I wrapped my hands around my sheepskin shoulder straps. My shoulders tensed. We were ready to blast off, but we couldn’t reach mission control. I heard a faint voice in my headset. I looked at Roy. “Did you hear that?”

He shook his head.

I heard it again, with our call sign. “You don’t hear that?”

He shook his head again and picked up his iPhone.

I could hear his side of the conversation with Air Traffic Control. I read our instructions as he wrote them down on his knee-pad.

Pretty impressive, I thought, that I could hear ATC with my new CQ headset, even if the transmission was faint.

Moments later we were airborne. The Smoky Mountains were off our wing, then blurred by misty clouds, then out of sight. The band-aid was off.

[aplanehebuilt]

Diagonal Away From Home

“Ready?” Roy waited a moment for me to make eye contact.

We were on the taxiway, waiting clearance to take off.

The flaps were up, the canopy closed. The long, asphalt runway stretched off to either side.

I had my sunglasses and iPad.

Bright October sun warmed the cockpit.

I was happy I’d worn a t-shirt. I was wearing the pink Love at First Flight shirt Roy bought for me at EAA Airventure. It felt appropriate for the first flight of our open ended journey.

I gave a nod. “Ready.”

The controller’s voice came over the radio; “174 Romeo-Tango, clear for take-off, left turn-out approved.” Roy pushed the throttle, turned out to the runway, and we were in the sky.

“Our plane won’t see the hangar for a long time,” Roy said. “Feels strange.”

The house that used to be our home passed underneath, then the Portland office building where I’d worked, and the Columbia river where I’d sailed.

Twenty-plus years passed by in thirty nautical miles, and five minutes. I wasn’t sad. My little girls were women now, my career complete, the house had felt big and empty, and the river too small.

I pulled out the IPad. “I have no idea where we’re staying tonight,” I said. I’d only danced around trip prep, doing laundry, packing, sorting.

”It’s okay,“ Roy replied, “I have it figured out. I’ll show you when we stop for fuel.”

I nodded and held on to my sheepskin shoulder straps. The brown grasslands of Eastern Oregon and Idaho went rolling by.

Ahead of us lay One-thousand, five-hundred nautical miles of mountains and rolling plains to our first destination: The RV Fly-In at Petit Jean, Arkansas. With luck, we’d be there in two days.

An hour later we were in Mountain Home Idaho for fuel. I plopped down on the worn, brown sofa in the pilot lounge of the FBO. Sunlight bent through dusty blinds. Roy sat down next to me. “I found a place for the night in Wyoming that has reasonably priced fuel and a pilot lounge.”

I picked up a red pen off the coffee table, and pushed around a AAA battery someone had left behind. “A pilot lounge? As in camping?”

Instead trip planning, I’d had lunch with friends, gone to the beach with my daughter, shopped and erranded. It was more denial than lack of commitment. I was excited about our travels. I wanted to explore, and experience, get to know the people and places in our country, but I was afraid I was doing the same thing I’d done since I was a child in a military family. The longest I’d ever lived in one place was Portland. I was always moving, leaving friends, undoing my life, only to re-do it again.

I set the pen down. “Can we get a hotel tonight? For our first night out?”

He shifted in his seat. “I’d prefer free.”

I glanced at the clock behind the vacant customer service desk, with it’s display case of aviation paraphernalia for sale. The building was open, but the office was not. Very few are these days.

“It’s two now, and it’s a three hour flight. Would you call to be sure they’ll be open? I’m going to use the little girls room. Be right back.”

Roy was standing by the front door when I returned. “They close at five. Lets beat tracks.”

In the sky again. Grassland gave way to steep, forested slopes. In the distance, mountain peaks were dusted with early season snow.

I watched our ETA. Five thirty. Ten minutes ticked by. ETA was 5:40. I pointed at the Dynon in front of me. “Looks like we’ve picked up a headwind,” I said.

Roy nodded.

We weren't going to make it by five thirty. “Rawlins, Wyoming,” I said. “We stopped last year on our way to Petit Jean. Remember? The line guy was super nice and gave us a ride to a hotel.”

“Okay,” he nodded, “A hotel it is.” He shrugged and changed our course.

The mountains rose in front of us. Ten thousand feet above sea-level. Crystal blue lakes and patches of snow provided a deceptively inviting landscape. There were no ‘plan B’s’ for us here. Roy was focused on engine monitoring. He pointed at the navigation display in front of him. Four triangles with long yellow lines. The lines indicate speed and direction.

“Those guys are fast,” he said. I looked off our wing. I felt the rumble in my inner ear before I saw them. Four F-15’s sped by. “Caution wake turbulence,” I said. No sooner had I said the words than our plane bounced side to side. A con-trail ran in a long, white line where they’d been, then curved around toward us. “They’re coming back,” I squirmed in my seat. “They can see us, right?” Headlines flashed across my brain; Small plane obliterated in mid-Air collision with military fighter.

Roy turned a knob on the flight deck, and our plane banked gently to the left. “I think we’re fine,” he said, “but just in case.”

No sooner had he said the words than the jets were off our wing again, four of them, so close I could see the pilots. I inhaled sharply. “I think they’re looking at us.”

Roy grinned. “They’re probably thinking, cool plane. Wish I was flying one of those.”

The mountains rolled down to dark, rocky plains, liked plains like curled fists. Roy pulled the throttle back and we began our descent. Two states away, and it wasn’t even dinner time yet. It is a cool plane, I thought, and smiled. I’m ready.

[aplanehebuilt]

When we first set out we were looking for adventure. When we found out what they were about, we stopped looking, but they found us anyway.

M. Wylie Blanchett, The Curve of Time (via aplanehebuilt)

[aplanehebuilt]

Pie Insurance

“I’ve been coming here since they opened,” Jim explained. “My brother and I flew out of here when it was a grass strip.” He looked at me from under bushy eyebrows. “My brother doesn’t fly anymore.”

The waitress returned with order pad in hand, took our orders and made sure our coffee mugs were full. Warm sun flooded in the window next to me.

“Does he still live around here?” I asked. My mug was orange, like the sun, bright, warm, comforting. I took my time stirring cream into my coffee, and enjoyed a long sip. I’d waited for my morning coffee, thinking we’d be here for breakfast, and so I wouldn’t be uncomfortable on the flight over.

“No,” Jim set his mug down and shook his head. Brown salt and pepper curls waved around his eyebrows. “He lives in a care facility in California.”

I studied his brown eyes. The sparkle had faded. Outside the window, clouds passed over the sun. Two boys ran around the playground. They climbed about on child-sized planes, set on a large springs that rocked side to side. That’s how it starts, I thought.

“My brother was flying over to Bellingham one day. The weather was IMC, complete soup, but my brother was IFR legal and a skilled pilot.”

The waitress appeared with plates of food stacked on her arms. “Who has the veggie omelette?” I was grateful for the interruption. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to hear the rest of the story. I know there are risks. There’s always risk. I’ve become intimately familiar with those risks. I just don’t like to think about them. I don’t want to play them over and over in my mind, until I’m too afraid to leave the ground - too afraid the fly with Roy.

Roy and Warren set to their food, and talked about the various planes Warren has built. Six in the hangar now, including the RV-6 that was in process. Jim was quiet while he ate his sandwich. Maybe I was off the hook. Or maybe there was a happy ending.

“So what happened?” I asked. I just had to ask, didn’t I. 

“The controller gave him bad direction. They had him fly at 1000 feet.”

Past the playground and the fuel pump, a fellow in a brown flight jacket opened a hangar door and pulled out a navy blue bi-plane. A young couple stood nearby, waiting for the ride of their lives. They’d see the sparkling waters of Puget Sound and the jagged peaks of the Olympics from a vantage very few get to see. Their flight would be thrilling, and joyous. But it wouldn’t be even half the joy Roy and I, and others of our aviation tribe experience. It wouldn’t have the same joy, because their flight doesn’t carry with it the hours spent in a airplane hangar pounding rivets, or studying weather and courses or learning how to look up that one radio frequency you can’t find to get an IFR pop-up when you’re going to be in the clouds like it or not. Because, the gods willing, they’d never know the pure, simple joy of feeling their breath after landing on a gravel road. Or the intense sadness of hearing that a friend has not been so fortunate, despite all their skill, training and discipline.

“The controller told him wrong. Their directions put him right on the side of the mountain at Lummi. It was 24 hours before they could get a search team up there. By then, he had frostbite, in addition to the other injuries.” Another sip of coffee. “He’s never been the same.”

“Thank you for sharing your story,” I said. “You still fly thought?” The waitress came to take our plates.

He nodded. “What else am I gonna do? I fly round here. The coffee run. And I fly to California, when the weather is good, to visit my brother.”

I picked my fork up off my plate, and turned to the waitress. “I’d like a slice of the raspberry peach crumble,” I said, “if you have any left. And if there’s enough, I’d like a slice to go also.”

The waitress smiled. “Sure thing, honey,” and she winked at Jim again and turned back to the kitchen. Jim raised an eyebrow. “Pie for breakfast?”

“Absolutely,” I replied. “It’s the Pie Insurance.”

Jim’s face broke out in to a smile. “Where did you hear that?“

“Here at the Spruce Goose. We were having breakfast here with friends a few years ago. They said eating pie here before flying over the Straits of Juan De Fuca is insures a smooth, uneventful flight.

Jim busted out laughing. “Pie Insurance! I coined that phrase years ago. And here it is, coming back to me.”

After lunch we said goodbye to Jim and Warren and hopped in our plane for the flight home. The afternoon sun was reflecting of the wide stretch of water between Port Townsend and the San Juan Islands.

I relaxed in the sun-warmed cockpit, snuggled into my sheepskin shoulder harness and looked down at the sea. A garbled voice came over the radio. “Did you hear that?” I asked Roy.

“Traffic,” announced the automated voice from our planes computer.

Roy nodded. “I think it’s a signal reflection. I think it’s us.”

“Traffic,” the computer squawked again, and Roy and I gasped. Roy instinctively pulled the stick to starboard. The wing dipped and my heart stopped as a small Cessna flew over our plane.

When I could breathe again, I said “I could see the cotter pins on their landing gear!”

“Uh, huh,” Roy nodded and squeezed my hand.

The faint scent of exhaust and fuel, the instrument display, the slight adjustments to the throttle and mixture were our only accompaniment as we flew north.

“We need to fly more,” I said. “We need the practice.”

The craggy, hooked end of Lopez was below us now. “I’m happy you think so.” Roy pulled the throttle back and we started to descend.

“I want to fly more,” I said. We needed to fly more. We needed to keep up our skills. And in that moment, I felt how the desire and learning and discipline drive one another in a closed loop.

“You bought pie to go?“ Roy asked. “For dessert tonight?” Now he was smiling.

“Things happen out there,” I nodded. “We need all the extra pie insurance we can get.”

[aplanehebuilt]

Flat in Jeff-Co

“It’s been a while.” I rested my hand on Roy’s knee. He looked handsome in his red hoodie, and gray sunglasses. I’d dressed up for the occasion too, abandoning my usual shorts and tee-shirt for jeans and a flowered blouse.

“Too long.” Roy placed his hand on mine.

We were 2,000 feet above Lopez Island, making 155 knots in our silver magic carpet. The occasion was our first flight in two months. Our RV-7A had been sitting on the tie-down’s at Orcas EastSound airport, while we’d been off on our sailboat, exploring the Canadian Gulf Islands. Two months is an eternity for us in aviation years.

“It’s beautiful,” I said. “It’s been fun sailing, but I’ve missed this.” It was true. I’d missed the sun was shining in the canopy and reflecting off the silver wing, watching ships left foamy wakes on the wide water of the Straits of Juan de Fuca, the feeling of the tilt of the wings as we turned downwind. “This is the perfect way to go out to breakfast,” I said.

The windsock was an orange cone at a slight angle to the runway at at Jefferson County. A cross-wind landing. I always squirm during cross-wind landings.

The gear touched down. I relaxed. Off the taxiway, past brown grass, colored flags waved in front of the Spruce Goose cafe.

There was a loud popping noise. Our plane made a wobbly, back and forth motion as we sped, then slowed, then wove is S-curves as we turned off on to a taxiway.

Roy cursed. He never curses. “Arrg. A Flat!” He banged his fists onto his knees.

The plane slowed to a stop. We climbed out and pushed the plane onto the grass. Flags were flying in front of the Spruce Goose Cafe. To the right of the restaurant there was a large hangar displaying the sign Biplane Rides. To the left was a maintenance shop and the Air Museum. Past that a row of neat hangars.

“It’s just a flat,” I said. Sure, we weren't up there, at the Spruce Goose, like the people already there, sitting at a table on the deck, sipping coffee, or eating Eggs Benedict, but things that could be much worse.

“I know,” he replied. “It’s just another thing. And here we are again, away from home, away from my hangar, and tools and…” He didn’t finish the sentence.

“There’s got to be someone with some tools…” This wasn’t our first rodeo, I thought. This isn’t the first time we’ve been at some far away airport with some issue. Somehow, it always works out.

And then magically, as if I waved a wand, two fellas drove up in a pick up truck. “A flat?” They asked.

Jim was tall, with brown eyes that belied a sense of humor and salt and pepper curls that spilled around his face. Warren was shorter with close-cropped brown hair. They both wore jeans and flannel shirts. “I’m building a 6-A and I think I have a spare tube,” Warren said. They were part of our tribe, do-er’s and builders.

After a few trips back and forth to his airplane hangar, Warren provided not only a tube but a jack to lift the wing of the plane to get the errant wheel off. Roy opened the tool box we carry. With his small, electric drill to un-do the wheel pants, snips to remove safety wire, and the flat was fixed… as if by magic.

I squinted against the reflection off the wing as Roy and I pushed the plane to transient parking. Jim and Warren walked ahead of us. They’d agreed to join us for lunch.

“You two again?” The waitress greeted Jim and Warren with a smile and a wink. She was twenty-something and cute with a bob-style haircut.

“I’m a bit of a fixture,” around here, Jim said. Couples who’d driven in front town, or pilots, usually two fellas each wearing jackets, filled the restaurant. Warm, brown tables with comfortable, solid brown chairs.

“I’ll just have coffee,” Warren said. The waitress handed Roy and I menus. “I know what you want,” she said to Jim. She danced off to fill coffee mugs at another table.

“I’ve been coming here since they opened,” Jim explained. “My brother and I flew out of here when it was a grass strip.” He looked at me from under bushy eyebrows. “My brother doesn’t fly anymore.”

To Be Continued...

[aplanehebuilt]

Falling Back to Earth

Roy and I returned to earth orbit in a big, silver tube with our RV-fliers crew. The shock of re-entry was immediate. My god, Dallas is shiny and new, I thought as we drove past the city skyline. The city was Sci-Fi movie towering and glossy. After a week spent in Roatan, Honduras, where clean drinking water and air conditioning are luxuries, and the ocean was in my eyes all the day, I felt disjointed and displaced.

Our friends Taco and Cannon smoothed the shock of re-entry with chicken wings and good beer, and their warm hospitality around their dining table. It was a tether to hold on to, as I fell back to earth.

Those Daring Men and their Flying Machines: Taco and Roy.

The next day, Roy and I were back in our airplane, making our way west across Texas toward Arizona and our Little Silver House.

Bravo Flight reunion at the Hard 8 BBQ: Taco, Cannon, Scoot, Cookie, Yours Truly and My Darling Hubby, Roy. Cookie and Scoot pictured above in flight.

“Be sure to miss the chimney at the end of the runway,” Scoot said. Our trek across Texas wouldn’t be complete without stopping to visit Scoot and Cookie – Bravo Flight Lead from our from our RV-fliers family. Scoot and Cookie live at Aero Country, near Austin Texas.

“Would you like to see the bats downtown?” Cookie asked.

“Bats? I love bats,” I said.

“We’ll need to leave by 6,” Tanya said. “We can’t be late.”

The four of us drove downtown and set our camping chairs at the edge of a park along Lady Bird Lake and under the Congress Street Bridge. There were a few people lined up on the bridge above, and a few others sitting around, enjoying a sunny, warm afternoon. The four of us sipped micro-brews and chatted about – well, airplanes, of course. The time slipped away in that silky way it has on a lovely evening while spending time with a drink and a friend. The sun was low in the sky when Cookie said, “Look behind you.”

The park was packed with people. And so was the bridge above. The air had a buzz of energy, as if a famous Rock Band was appearing. As soon as the sun dipped below the horizon, the bats started appearing. “About 750,000 bats at this time of year,” Cookie said. “They are all females. When the pups are born, there will be 1.5 million bats.”

The Congress Avenue Bridge is home to the world’s largest urban bat colony. During a 1980’s reconstruction, there was a movement to eradicate the bats. In came the Bat Conservation Society. Bats are incredibly gentle, and on any given night, will consume 10,000 to 20,000 pounds of insects. The bat population also now brings in an estimated 7.9 million dollars annually in tourist revenue.

The bats came out from under the bridge a few at a time, then in emergence, flying over the lake, and against the sunset reflection of the city skyline. The crowd around us murmured in awe and so did we.

The next day we continued west. Glossy city skyline turned to and farm land, which then turned to a dismal patch-work quilt of oil fields.

“It’s what keeps our plane in the air,” Roy said, in response to my grumble.

“I read about this place where the earth is collapsing in huge Sinks, “ I said. “It’s because the water pumped in to the ground to push the oil out has dissolved a salt layer way down deep. The town’s called Wink and the big crater is called the Wink Sink. It’s somewhere in West Texas,”

Roy poked at buttons on the AFS. “Wink is about 80 miles from here. Think we can find it?”

My cell phone/computer had a small signal. I scanned the satellite view and found a large, blue circle. “I’ve got the GPS coordinates,” I said.

The largest of the two Wink Sinks. This one is bigger than a football field. The town of sink is out of view in this photo, but is a scant mile away. 

The next day, we were flying away from the New Mexico sunrise toward Arizona. Three hours later, we could smell the barn. Roy keyed the mic, “Experimental 174RT, 5 miles south, inbound for landing.”

A curt voice came on the radio. “Lake Havasu Airport is closed.”

“What the heck?” we said at the same time. “Call ATC,” I said. No one was talking on the Lake Havasu CTAF.

“Confirmed, the airport is closed due to an accident.” The controller was calm and polite.

My heart sank. Then my inner voices started their conflicting dialog of fear and joy. It’s a constant tug of war sometimes, up in the air in our chairs in the sky. And sometimes my joy ends up face down in the mud. I was not going to let this be one of those time.

“Let’s go to Kingman.” I nudged Roy.

“We can get lunch there,” Roy replied.

There's a time when eating dessert first is appropriate.

We borrowed the courtesy car from the Kingman FBO to drive the 60 miles to Lake Havasu. The car was a tired, old pickup. It was 101 outside, and the AC didn’t work. I’m falling, I thought.  I’m falling, across the ocean of desert, to our little silver house, to home.

Snapped this photo out the rear window as we drove past Lake Havasu Airport. Getting this plane on the ground following an engine failure took some steely-eyed aviating For Sure. For the record, the Pilot ejected and walked away.

I am not an Astronaut. I’m an earth-being. I’m parched and exhausted. I’ve been transformed by our flight across Texas - transformed by bats, by sink-holes, by planes skidding off runways. What will I do with all of this when I get back to earth? When my feet were back on terra-firma, I did what any woman in my place would do – called my GF, J. I spilled my soul over the phone. “You’ll figure it out,” she said. “And when you do, you’ll write about it.”

[aplanehebuilt]

Escape Velocity

We began on earth, north of Houston, Texas (KDWH), immersing ourselves in fields of earthy green, and blankets of Bluebonnets. Paul and Maria drove their Porsche, Roy and I followed in their Audi. I kept a seat-heater on and regretted not packing long pants.

Lift Off:

The next day I borrowed a pair of jeans from Maria, and the four of us shuttled out to Houston’s NASA Space Center. Maria is a docent for the Saturn 5 Rocket, and she’d offered to give us a tour. I love science the way some people love pie or spa days. Maria loves science too. When we’re together, we geek out for hours talking about the observation of the wave properties of hydrogen, or trajectory and orbit requirements for getting to Mars.

I felt my feet lift a few inches off the ground when Maria opened the door to the building where a Saturn 5 Rocket lay on its side. “Saturn 5,” Maria said as we stood gaping down the football-field length rocket, “because of the 5 engines,” she explained.

I walked along the gallery studying photos of the Apollo Astronauts while I listened to Maria talk about the accomplishments of the missions. “Each of the astronauts came back profoundly changed by the experience,” she said. I was gazing at the photo of earth rise, taken by Bill Anders. “How could you step away from all that is familiar, and not be forever changed by the experience?” I said.

In a small way, it was like what Roy and I were doing, having sold our house, left our friends and family and the familiarity of our life in Hillsboro, Oregon. For the last couple months we’d been in Lake Havasu, Arizona, living in our Airstream, and taking day trips in our RV-7A. Now we’d left our Little Silver House, and launched in our airplane across Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. Home was our Airstream. Now home was our Airplane. Now home was with our friends or family.

“Would you like to visit Mission Control?” Maria asked.

“Oh, yes,” Roy and I nodded together. Electricity tingled through my body as I stood in the press gallery looking down on the place where a group of people, and a computer system that had less memory than the refrigerator in our Airstream, launched 12 Apollo Missions. The 1960’s building we’d entered looked and felt the same as the Controls Systems buildings at the Stanford Linear Accelerator, where I’d been part of a team that created Z boson’s from 90Gev electron-positron interactions. The steel railing, and the concrete steps were the same. The building even smelled the same - the faint electrostatic smell of air conditioning blown over racks of computers and trays of cables and wires. It was the smell of focus and intensity, of long nights spent over consoles checking and re-checking every detail. It was the smell of curiosity and desire to achieve something greater than ourselves.

Parking Orbit:

“It was a problem of drainage,” Roy’s cousin David explained.

Roy and I paused in our trajectory to visit Roy’s cousin David, near Austin, Texas (KGTU). We were out for a walk in a park in the middle of three construction sites.

“No one wanted to buy this land to build on it,” David continued, “because of the drainage problem. So finally I convinced the owners to invest to address the problem. We decided to make it a park, with lighted walking paths, and a water feature in the middle. When there’s a heavy rain it’s filled with water, but most of the time it’s just green.”

The three of us strolled around the park. The center of the park was a solid blanket of bluebonnets.

“The flowers are lovely,” I said.

“We’ve sure been lucky this year with the wildflowers. That was my idea, to seed for flowers.” David smiled. “I’m glad ya’ll like it.”

From Austin we flew to Brenham (11R), borrowed the courtesy car and drove to the BlueBell Ice Cream factory. When hitchhiking through the galaxy, it’s important to eat dessert first:

We also spent a cushy night at the Hangar Hotel (T82), sipping martini’s and playing billiards in the Officers Club. The martini’s were due to the 30 knot cross-wind landing:

Transposition and Docking:

Aero Country, McKinney, Texas  (T31). The sky opened up and poured rain soon after we had our bags in the house. And then it hailed. Big, golf-ball size hail. I was incredibly grateful to our hosts, Taco and Cannon for tucking our plane away in their hangar, and us in their guest room. Our home is with family and friends, or friends that are family, in this case our RV family. 

I stood at the picture window, watching hail create a pop-corn fountain in their swimming pool and thought about our flight in the big silver tube the next day to Roatan, Honduras. Towering cumulus aren’t fun no matter what kind of plane you’re in. 

Lunar Orbit:

My Darling Hubby and I pulled on our wet-suits, grabbed our mask, fins and snorkel and made our way down the sandy path to the dock. We’d met the rest our group of RV’ers and DWF and left earth orbit together for the Island of Roatan, Honduras. Our dive master was loading tanks on to the boat. “Buen Dia,” she said, “Your gear is set up there,” Our friends were already on board. “A little windy,” one of them said. “A beautiful day for diving,” said another.

Powered Decent:

The Captain fired up the twin 200’s in a cloud of smoke, and off we went, across shallow patches where sea grass brushed the hull, over azure places where sand stretched between rocky reefs, out to a mooring ball on the edge of the deep blue. A shuffle and clank of tanks as we all donned our gear, then I was off the boat and floating above the barrier reef. I inflated my BDC, adjusted my mask and relaxed in to the gentle swells. Roy gave me the “let’s descend” signal. I replaced my snorkel with my regulator and followed him down in to the deep blue.

We swam out the ledge and floated down over coral covered lava flows. There were enormous lobsters with antenna waving from under crevices. Schools of Blue Tang swam by our faces, followed by brilliant hued Parrot fish and an enormous Grouper. I tugged on Roy’s shoulder and pointed out a Barracuda overhead. I swam down to a sponge the size of a wine barrel, and noticed tiny, orange fish, and a delicate shrimp with legs like thin gold wires and a tiny, blue-jewel body.

I must have been on sensory overload. Roy swam up to me and pointed at my dive computer. It read 72 feet. How had I drifted that deep? Roy gave me the signal that means “how much air do you have left?”

“1000 Psi,” I motioned back. Enough to get back to the boat, not much extra. I’d been so immersed in the golden-legged shrimp I hadn’t noticed.

I followed my bubbles up the wall, to where coral flattened out and stretches of white sand spread between them. I spotted a flounder flying above the sand, barely visible with its camouflage. Our dive master clanged her tank, waved her thumb and pinky and pointed at the sand. A Hawksbill Turtle was swimming lazily over the reef.

I didn’t want to go back up. I held my arms and legs out and felt myself free of gravity. Then I tucked in to a ball and rolled over and over, by tank flopping against my back with each turn. I’m a mermaid, a fish, I’m a sea-being. Roy motioned thumbs up. My turn at the swim ladder. I pulled off my fins and broke the surface. I’m an earth being, an explorer, and a curious wanderer.

[aplanehebuilt]

No Runway Lights

I grew up on an Air Force Base during the Vietnam Conflict. I never had a fascination with aviation. If anything, planes equated with fear. I’d be walking home from school, listening to the roar of B-52’s taking off one after the other and my breath would tighten in my chest. If there were no empty desks at school after the planes returned, I could breathe easy. An empty desk meant a Dad didn’t come home.

My father, Major Gary Casteel, crewed on this B-52 out of Castle AFB.

Aviation wasn’t associated with joy until I started flying with Roy. Our magic carpet has been an adventurous way to get around, still it’s a plane, and the association with fear has never entirely faded. So it is a bit incongruous that I suggested flying from our Snow-bird base of Lake Havasu to Houston, Texas via Belen, New Mexico. Belen wasn’t even close to on our way. Strangely, I wanted to see the miles of desert between folded granite mountains from the air. I wanted to have the feeling of taking off and landing, and I wanted to eat at Penny’s Diner and stay in the funky, friendly FBO at Alexander Municipal.

I got all that, and the added bonus of an incredibly bumpy flight in a gusty thirty knot tailwind.

After dinner Roy and I took our full tummies out for an evening walk around the airport.

“It’s so quiet,” Roy whispered. So quiet, in fact, I thought I could hear the soles of our shoes sticking to the warm asphalt. “Except for the coyotes,” I whispered back.

Half way down the taxi-way, Roy said “we forgot our headlamps.” The gibbous moon hadn’t risen and the stars were brilliant.

“It’s ok,” I replied, “I’d rather have my night vision.” I was watching anxiously out in the brush for the reflected light of eyes of critters. My eyes caught a flash of yellow. The industrial looking fire truck parked next to the FBO had its lights on and was rolling.

Roy glanced over his shoulder. “Must be a fire somewhere,” he said.

“Wait,” I tugged on his hand, “it’s coming down the runway. No, it’s coming down the taxi-way. It’s coming toward us.”

Roy kept walking. Maybe, he said.

I headed for pea-gravel and grass, and hopped back and forth from the asphalt to the desert and back.

“What are you doing?” He stopped and watched my dance.

“Off the taxi-way. I don’t want to get run over. I also don’t want to get bit by a snake or a tarantula.”

He turned on his cell phone flashlight, shone it on the pea-gravel, and tilted it up a bit to illuminate our presence. In moments, the diesel engine was chugging next to us. The driver killed the flashing lights and rolled the window down.

“Are you folks okay?” A polite way of saying ‘what the heck are you doing out here?’

I waved my arm in the direction of the FBO. “We have a plane here. We’re out for our evening walk.” I felt a bit of panic in my throat and heard it in my voice. I felt like I’d been pulled over by the M.P’s on the AFB when hair-brained teenage me, and my equally hair-brained friends were out doing things we shouldn’t have been, in places we were not allowed to be. Roy stepped in front of me and said something that sounded rational.

“We’ve got a plane coming in,” the polite fireman said. “You folks be careful out here.” Roy thanked him, the lights came back on, and the truck drove off.

“Look,” I pointed at the night sky. “There it is. See that row of yellow lights? That looks big.” It did look big. And there was a familiar rumble. I couldn’t quite place… I knew that sound… and I did not want to be anywhere close to the runway when it landed. I did an awkward backwards dance down the taxi-way. 

“Where are you going now?” Roy asked. He shone the cell phone light on the asphalt. There were large, yellow stripes in front of us, and a curving taxi-way line. “We’re behind the hold short line,” he said.

“I know that sound. I’m getting out of the way.”

I was no longer afraid of being bit by a snake. After spending my entire life around planes, after all the times I’ve been being afraid of turbulent air knocking us out of the sky, I was about to be clobbered by a plane on a runway. “It’s big,” I said again, and skipped-ran into the desert dirt. Bits of gravel and dust kicked up around my feet. The row of yellow lights was closer.

“Strange,” Roy said, “it’s so quiet.” The still night air was barely disturbed. There was a faint whirring sound, and the thrum of the diesel fire truck, now parked at the end of the taxiway. Then the air stirred up in a cool, whirring breeze. Dust flew in circles in the light of the cell phone. Then a loud rhythm of propellers beat the air, then there it was in front of us; a large, dark 4-engine plane touched down, then disappeared in to the dark, as if it had never been there.

“Wow. No runway lights,” Roy said. “That’s impressive. Yea, that was big.”

“A Hurky-Bird,” I said.

“A C-130,” Roy said.

“Yes. A C-130. “No runway lights,” I repeated. “Impressive, indeed.” My knees were shaking.

We had a comfortable night in the FBO. The rumble of engines lasted through the night, though I couldn’t tell if they were in my dreams or if they were real. The next morning, the fire engine was back in place, and the morning air was still. And, by the way, the Chicken Fried Steak at Penny’s Diner is amazing.

[aplanehebuilt]

Petit Jean - The Best Parts

  “I don’t see the runway,” I craned my head to look over the wing of the plane. A red and gold canopy stretched out below us. Roy turned downwind, then I spotted it – a long asphalt strip between the trees. Then we were on the ground following the golf cart with the orange flag. “We’re not the first ones to arrive,” I said. Several other pilots also decided to beat the weather and arrive a before the official start of the annual Petit Jean Fly-in, organized by EAA Chapter 165.

Bill Schlatterer greeted us with a big “Hello, Happy you made it.” I’d been looking forward to Petit Jean since we folded up our tent at the end of last year’s gathering. I wasn’t just happy we’d made it. I was thrilled. These are the very best parts:

    Andrew from TruTrack offering us a beer from his RV-10 keg-erator.

    Elvis, one of our new friends from the Antilles trip last spring appearing from the campground to greet us. “Hi you guys!” Such a great surprise! 

     Sitting in cane back rockers on the large, slate patio at Mather Lodge, laughing and chatting with Dan Horton and his adorable wife Patti. The setting sun over Cedar Creek Canyon in a glowing collage of gold and red. The air had a moist, earthy scent that mingled well with the amber liquid in our glasses procured from Lynchburg, Tennessee.

    The official kick-off dinner at Rockefeller Center. So many new people, so many names. The room was filled with conversation and laughter. Roy chatted with people he knows from the Vans Air Force. He was with his tribe. The voices and laughter swirled around. Crowds are hard for me.

    I’m calling it a night, I said to Roy, gave him a peck on the cheek, and made my way out of the dining room, passed pictures of Winthrop Rockefeller and the history of how he rejected New York life for Arkansas. Old grain towers stood in the mist outside. That meant the field would be IFR the following day, and friends we’d hoped to see wouldn’t be able to make it. This was not the best part.

    Hiking with Roy down a rocky canyon, along a trickle of a river, under quiet trees, back up the canyon. So peaceful and different from the dense green of Oregon.  

    Driving the shuttle van, taking campers to trail heads or the lodge and back to the fly-in at the campground. The best part was talking to the Air Boss on the VHF: “Air Boss, this is Van One. Permission to take the Active?”

    “Van One, go ahead.”

    I love speaking ATC.

    Later that afternoon, in the grassy space between the cooking tent and the social tent with a beer in my hand. The air smelled faintly of tomato soup and buttery grilled cheese sandwiches. People milled about in small groups around tents in the campground, and about airplanes in the tie-down area. I recognized Kelli. She was chatting with a group of other campers. I haven’t been introduced, but Roy knows her husband and their airplane, Kelli Girl. I thought about joining the conversation, but I didn’t know how. I felt like the new kid. Then Kelli noticed me and said, “I heard you’ve stayed at Mather Lodge and Rockefeller Center. Which do you like?” It turns out that, like me, she still has her collection of Nancy Drew books, and like me finds books easier than people.

   Tail Number Bingo, and Bean Bag Toss and prizes. The sun breaking through the clouds and a light mist shimmered over the runway. Pilots running for their planes, then taking off in formation, giving us on the ground all quite a show.

   Then suddenly, it was evening and I’d spent the entire afternoon swapping stories and playing games and watching airplanes with all my new friends.

    We lined up, piled our plates with BBQ ribs and chicken, cornbread, sipped on sweet tea, sat down around the long tables under the social tent, ate our fill, and declared our appreciation for the peach cobbler. Bill took up the microphone. “We want to thank you all for coming,” he said, “and just so ya’ll know, you are the event. This is what it’s all about.”

    And that was the very best part.

[aplanehebuilt]

Having No Plan to Meet Jack

Roy and I were snuggled on a worn, red sofa, our feet propped on the coffee table. Embers crackled and popped in the fireplace. The fire smelled of apple-wood. The last bits of sunlight filtered through window, slanting across the dining table and yellow carpet. I held a book, and Roy, his computer. Outside, gold and red trees rustled on the roof. Images of our time spent hiking the trails of the Smokey Mountain National Park ran through my head, like water in the rivers we’d walked along.

The Petit Jean Fly-in was next on our agenda. That started Friday, and it was only Tuesday. We’d be checking out of the Buckhorn Inn the next morning, with no plan between now and then. I always like to have a plan. I like to know where we’re going, where we’ll find dinner and where we’ll sleep.

As much as it unnerves me not having a plan, I couldn’t work up to making one. I wanted to stay where we were, in our cozy cabin. But weather was moving in to Tennessee and if we didn’t make for Arkansas, we wouldn’t be able to attend the Fly-in.

Roy looked up from his computer. “Where should we go tomorrow?”

I shrugged. “Somewhere in West Tennessee,” I replied, “Or Arkansas.” I abdicated control with a sip of wine. Roy nudged my shoulder. “How about visiting the Jack Daniels Distillery?”

“That sounds great,” I said. I thought of looking for hotels and restaurants, but my book and glass of wine felt higher priority. It’ll be fine, I told myself. It’s okay to not have a plan, I reassured myself.

The next day we flew out of the Knoxville Downtown Airport into a cloud-streaked autumn sky. There was just enough sun to illuminate the brilliant forest beneath us. There wasn’t much time to admire; we’d be landing in Tullahoma in an hour, and we had no plan. I poked at Foreflight on the iPad to see what hotels there were, and find a place to have dinner.

 “Foreflight says there’s a courtesy car,” I said.  

Roy nodded. “I expect there is.”

“Can we use it to get to and from our hotel?” FBO’s aren’t always okay with keeping the car overnight.

“I was hoping we’d camp in the pilot lounge,” he said.

I squirmed. And if we can’t? I thought. FBO’s were less kind to traveling pilot’s these days because of security regulations, or to refrain from competing with local hotels, especially in tourist destinations. We’d met with such mixed results to our request to camp in the pilot lounges recently that I’d started to feel like a hobo when I’d asked. Or maybe it was my military up-bringing, that one should always be self-reliant and asking for things is weakness, kicking in. My mind pictured the two of us, tired after a full day of travel and tourist-ing, calling around trying to find a basic clean bed and shower, and me getting grumpy and wanting dinner, and, and… Don’t be such a control freak, I told myself. It’ll be fine.

“Camping is fine,” I said, “But would you ask this time?”

The folks at the Tullahoma airport FBO greeted Roy and me as if we were expected. Roy signed our N-number on the courtesy car form and asked about staying the night in the pilot lounge. The gal behind the desk said, “Sure. No problem.”

“What’s your favorite place to eat?” I asked her, my adventurous side kicking in.

“Route 59 BBQ” she replied. “I go there for lunch all the time.”

We stacked our gear in the pilot lounge, climbed in the old Ford Taurus that was the courtesy car, and drove out to Lynchburg, Tennessee. We paraded through the grounds with our tour group, snapped photos, sniffed vats of fermenting mash, listened to our guide share the history and unique process for making Tennessee Whiskey, sipped a sample flight, and exchanged some airplane fuel for a few bottles of Single Barrel Select.  

We drove back to Tullahoma in the fading sun and found Route 59 BBQ at the edge of town. Two young gals in a place the size of my grandma’s kitchen piled mouth-watering chicken and ribs, a healthy square of cornbread, and savory pinto beans on to Styrofoam plates. No room left in our bellies for Blackberry cobbler, the kind topped with a pastry crust, so we took that to go.

The FBO was quiet when we returned. All the lights were out and the doors locked. An access code let us in to the pilot lounge, kitchenette and restrooms. It was our own, private space. Roy turned the TV on to the last game of the World Series. We curled up in recliners, ate blackberry cobbler, and cheered the Astro’s to victory.

That night I lay snuggled in my sleeping bag on the nubby carpeted floor next to my snoring hubby. I listened to the hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen, and watched the green and white flash of the airport beacon diffract across the window blinds. I smiled from deep inside. A perfect day, and a perfect evening, and not a single bit of it was planned. And it was fine.

[aplanehebuilt]

Don’t Forget to Notice

Roy climbed up a loosely arranged stack of slippery blocks around a hairpin turn between trees. His foot slipped. For a heart-thudding moment his center of gravity wavered downhill toward me. I reached up with both hands to catch him. He laughed as he regained his footing. “It’s the Appalachia River Trail,” he said, grinning at me over his shoulder.

I studied the trail and selected my footing between trees and around fist-sized, square rocks, and tree-roots, like gnarled arms poking out of the ground and muddy puddles. “Or the Appalachia Muddy Trail,” I said. 

I laughed with him, but inside I was thinking of what we’d do if one of us were injured. The road was somewhere down the steep slope to our left, past dense trees and underbrush. If we needed to go for help it was either that, or running, stumbling and sliding two or more miles to the trail head. Neither was a great option.

That morning we studied the map of the Smokey Mountain National Park and found a place where the Appalachia Trail crossed the highway three miles before famous Clingmans Dome, the highest point in the Park. The trail looked like it ran along the road, so it couldn’t be too hard, we thought. And the views will be spectacular. We’ll take our time, we told ourselves, and a picnic lunch. Sure it was forty degrees and rainy. We’re north-westerners. We can handle it.

The trail was easy at first. Then it turned away from the road and rose steadily up the ridge-line. The silence was deafening. The wind blew a constant, rustling woosh in the tree tops. Our breath came in wet puffs of mist and drops of water splashed on us from the dense canopy above. We were immersed in trees. We were completely alone.

I started humming a tune.

Roy looked at me over his shoulder. “You’re humming,” he said.

“Yes, I am.” I replied.

My mind flashed to the two of us, in the plane, with the mountains below us, or the desolate New Mexico desert. It’s only the two of us then, alone, with the hum of the engine. I’m always studying the charts and the terrain, and thinking of alternates. Roy’s already thought of them. Roy is always calm and alert. I’m the nervous Nellie. In the plane, I crochet to calm my nerves. When I’m hiking, I hum. It’s a habit I learned years ago in the Sierra Nevada’s, hiking with my children in bear country.

“Consider it risk mitigation,” I said. “Want to sing with me?” He shook his head.

An enormous fungus growing on the side of a tree caught my eye. I reached up and tugged on Roy’s sleeve. “Look at that.”

In the plane I remind myself to look up, to read the instruments, to notice the terrain, rivers, farms, houses. Don’t forget to notice, I tell myself.

The sun was clocking its way to the horizon when we found a log suitable for sitting. We ate turkey sandwiches and said ‘Hello’ to the first people we’d seen all day – a group of fit looking young men carrying huge backpacks. Their hiking boots looked well up to the task of ‘just out for a few days on the trail’.

“Time to head back,” Roy said as he packed our supplies back in our small blue cooler.

“My legs don’t want to get up.” I pulled myself up anyway. Three and a half miles to get here. Three and a half miles back. We’d hiked steadily uphill along the ridge, so how could it be that the trail was uphill going back? My ankles twisted on rocks and my boots squished in wet mud. The light was fading. “Keep going,” I said aloud. “The alternative is sleeping out here in the woods, and that’s not acceptable.”

Roy tugged on my sleeve and pulled me back a step. He pointed at a break in the trees. The wide, folds of the Smokey Mountains spread out in front of us in a blanket of red and gold. It’s why we came here, in our little plane, across country, over mountains and deserts, where the plan B’s are not always obvious. To hike the Appalachia Trail, and to witness the glory of the change of seasons.

“Don’t forget to notice the awesome beauty,” Roy said. He wrapped his arm across my shoulders and we just stood there for a while. 

[aplanehebuilt]

Courage is the price that Life extracts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release. From little things: Knows not the livid loneliness of fear, Nor mountain heights where bitter joy can hear The sound of wings.

Amelia Earhart (via aplanehebuilt)

[aplanehebuilt]

Collecting Stories - Part Two

We had a day to wander before we were due to visit Roy’s cousin in Tennessee. Roy has family all over the south. They share fond memories of family gatherings and summer vacations at the lake. I envy them. My connection to family is a vague memory from early childhood, from days before we moved from place to place during my Fathers 23 years in the U.S.A.F.

I noted on the chart we were a 20 minute flight from Gassville, Arkansas. “My Dad’s parents are buried there,” I said to Roy. “Let’s go there. You can see where my Dad’s family is from.”  

Our chart app showed that Flippin, Arkansas (KFLP) had a courtesy car and was a 10 minute drive to Gassville. The airport manager leaned on the wing of our plane when we arrived. “I tell people 3 or 4 times a week,” he said, “we don’t have a courtesy car any more. I’m sorry for that. No way to get around.”

I turned to Roy and shrugged. “It’s almost lunchtime. Let’s take our picnic lunch over there and figure out what we’ll do next.” The FBO was a neat white building with a covered picnic table out front.

“May as well,” the manager agreed. “I’m Bob,” he said, and reached out his hand to help me with the lunch cooler.

Bob and another fellow joined us at the picnic table. “Where ya’ll from?” Bob asked.

“From Oregon,” Roy said. “Outside Portland.”

Bob said that he’d been to the Pacific Northwest. Spent some time in Alaska. Roy and I noshed on left over ribs, cornbread and pickles while we listened to his story:

Once you go to Alaska, you just fall in love. I went there for a summer in my early twenties and I stayed for thirteen years. Back then, you could literally pick fish outta the water. One day I saw this sign on a bulletin board that read ‘Free - Subsistence Fish Net’. I was curious and willing to try anything, so I looked the guy up. He showed me this net that looked like nuth’in but a big ‘ol knotty ball of rope. But it was free and the guy said he’d take me out and show me how to use it. First, I had to get my Subsistence Fishing license, so I went down to the office to do that. The gal behind the counter handed me a form that listed different types of fish, so I put ‘2 salmon’ and handed her back the form. She pushed it back and said, “We only deal in 100’s”. I thought that sounds like a lot of fish but I filled it in anyway.

The next day I drove to the fella’s house that had the net. We rolled it out of the shed and muscled it up into the bed of his truck, and drove out to this rocky beach that was down this steep hill. The guy showed me how to stick one in at the beach with rebar, then unroll it perpendicular to the beach, anchor the other end with rebar, then anchor the bottom with cinder blocks. We did all this while the tide was out. The guy said when the tide comes in, the floats on the top of the net would lift it up and the fish will swim right in. He patted me on the shoulder and said “Good Luck”, and drove off.

So I sat up there on the bluff and waited while the tide rolled in. Sure enough, the net lifted up when the water came in, and soon the net was roiling and boiling with fish. I ran back to town and got my buddy who had a little boat. I can tell you it was a mess getting those fish outta that net, and I understand now why these nets have big ‘ol holes in them, because pretty soon you’re just cutting away to get those fish out because they swim in and get their gills caught. My buddy and I spent all that day hauling fish up that hill and into his truck, and I missed work that day and the next two days while we hauled fish up the hill.

This fish processing place that gave us some space and we spent the next three days cleaning and freezer bagging fish. I gave a third to the food bank, a third to friends and I shipped a big Styrofoam box to my Mom and my buddy and I split the rest. When we were done with all that, I went back to the bulletin board and tacked up a sign that said ‘Free - Subsistence Fish Net’.

Roy and I laughed and smiled, and I said “Amazing. Thanks for sharing that story.”

Bob’s friend said, “Where’d you folks say you want to go?”

“Gassville,” I said, wrapping up the remains of our lunch. “I want to see where my Grandparents are laid to rest. In the Baptist Cemetery.”

“I know where that is,” he nodded, “I’ll give you folks a ride.”

[aplanehebuilt]

Collecting Stories - Part One

Roy and I packed our RV-7A with our sleeping bags, our lightweight air mattresses, hiking shoes, my crocheting bag, and two duffel bags – one each, and each with a week of clothes. We also brought along two of our bear family. We planned to be gone for a month, and it didn’t feel right to leave them all in the Airstream, although they do have a nice view up there in our friend’s horse pasture.

It was the last day it would be fly-able for a while. Rain was forecast to arrive in the Pacific Northwest, and continue for at least a week. If we didn’t take advantage of the weather window, we’d miss meeting our friends in the Smokey Mountains – a trip we’d planned for a year, and we’d miss the annual Petit Jean RV Fly-Inn, which was a blast last year and we definitely wanted to be there this year. It was now or never. And what a perfect day to beat tracks. The sky was sparkling clear. The leaves were all red and gold and the Cascade Range was brilliant white-capped in the east. A few minutes after taking off from KHIO, Roy and I were counting the peaks of volcanoes.

The next day it did rain in Portland and Roy I were well away. We weren’t in a hurry. We took our lunch cooler to the picnic shelter outside the FBO at Gooding, Idaho (KGNG), then enjoyed tailwinds across Wyoming, and stopped for the night in Rawlins, Wyoming (KRWL). The FBO had been sold recently, we learned, which explained why none of the phone numbers listed in the Foreflight application worked. Self-serve fuel was no longer available, neither were courtesy cars, and the FBO closes promptly at 6pm. The good news was the EconoLodge was a short one mile walk, and the Line Guy offered to give us a ride back the next morning. 

The next day, we arrived in Searcy, Arkansas (KSRC) under a blue October sky. And it was pouring rain in Portland. 

Except for few “we were here” photos to joggle our memories later when one or the other asks, “What was that stop we made on that trip to the Great Smoky Mountains?” we didn’t take many snap-shots. Instead, I found myself listening to stories. It’s funny how people will open up to a stranger, a passer-by. Each story is a gift. I hope that I was a patient listener. The first story was given to us by LeRoy in Searcy, Arkansas:

The Airport Guys sat around the table in the FBO watching Roy pull our airplane up to the fuel pump. “That’s one of them home-built things,” I heard one of them say. I finished washing my coffee cup, dried my hands and reached in my pocket for one of our cards. “My husband built the plane,” I said, laying the card on the table. “We flew here from Portland, Oregon for the BBQ.” It was a great conversation starter, and it was true. The Whistle-Stop restaurant makes wonderful BBQ ribs.

LeRoy introduced himself. He may have been driving a tractor yesterday, or fifty years ago. He may have flown in the Korean War, or Vietnam. He’s weathered and wise in a plaid cotton shirt and I’ve learned long ago not to judges these books by their cover. “My wife and I made a trip out to the Northwest a few years ago,” he said. “Real purdy out there. We drove from Seattle and Puget Sound down to Orygon. Went drove out to the beach. We was standing there on a cliff looking out over the ocean, and waddaya know, and a P51 flew by! It circled around and flew right under us, below the cliff-line, so as we could see down at the pilot. That plane flew right under us! Then we drove down to McMinnville. That place where they have the Spruce Goose. Ever been there? Well, this friend of mine was working on recovering the rudder for that thing out in Porterville when they was moving it up there from California. He gave me a piece of fabric from that original rudder. I still have that piece of fabric.”