Skymaster

I was still on a high from the previous flight and spent most of the day in a foul mood as thunderstorms rolled in outside my office window all day long. My wife had called at about 6PM asking if my flight had been cancelled but naturally I told her that just like my baseball team, we wouldn’t be able to call it until we arrived at the field.

Things cleared up just as I arrived at the field. In fact it was a beautiful clear evening with mostly blue skies. My aircraft had been fuelled up and was waiting on the ramp for me. After a quick checkout I took to the skies off of runway 25. The circuit filled up over the next 90 minutes and I had the opportunity to see a variety of aircraft circling with me. For the last 40 minutes or so I had the weirdest looking aircraft behind me. Each time he keyed his mike and called in as Skymaster ABC, I let out a big of a giggle as I pictured some superhero behind the controls. Each time I turned to a new circuit leg in front of him I couldn’t help but to look back. This thing had a prop at the front and at the back to go with its dual vertical stabilizers. Mind blowing for a newbie like me!

I was really on the ball all night and was additionally having a ball. My power settings were good, my circuits were good, my approaches were good, and the landings were good. I felt as if I had enough time on each approach to double and triple check everything. It seemed as if everything was truly coming together. I was even able to seamlessly handle an unanticipated runway change that was communicated to me on the go. Very cool stuff. I think I like this flying thing.

When I arrived back at the club they were completely shut down so I had to fill out the paperwork in the little dispatch office. This made me feel especially important. It was odd not to have some instructors back at the club greet me as I arrived.

The final lessons of the day were that some people have no idea what they are doing with respect to knots - illustrated by the scenario I faced getting the tie downs on the plane. The other lesson was that without someone demonstrating to you how the control locks are put in place, it can be a long and frustrating process. Note to self: move the rudder pedals all the way forward.

With the initial solo portion of my circuit training complete, I will not move on to the next phase of training - short and soft field landings before moving back to the practice area.

26.4 hours and counting...