Following my first true "passenger"-carrying flight last weekend, this Saturday I followed up with taking a good friend of mine with me for breakfast at Double Eagle II. I'm happy to say that all went to plan, and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Richard starts flying lessons sooner instead of later.
In the week between Mom's flight and this past Saturday, I also moved to a new house; I was still hauling boxes over to the new house the night before the flight. At several points on our way to the airport I asked myself, "are you up to this?" Each time, my honest answer was the same: I'm rested and alert, I'm focused on the task at hand, and I am really looking forward to taking my friend up for his first ride on a small plane. (I had warned Richard that we would not be going if I couldn't honestly say those things.)
The flight from SAF to AEG was a great "first" experience for my passenger - the air was smooth and all went to plan. This was my first time flying into Double Eagle, but traffic was light and the tower cleared us to land before we were established on downwind, so it was mostly uneventful.
I say "mostly" as I had a brief "d'oh!" moment when I realized I'd been setting up for a right downwind to runway 4 - a prominent strip of black asphalt visible from 30 miles away - instead of to the barely-visible concrete of runway 35. Fortunately, I caught my error well before it would have been a problem, thanks to my practice of setting the course bug to point towards the active runway (a tip I picked up from the plane's owner.)
After a fantastic landing (if I say so myself) and some great food at the Bombing Range Cafe, we were soon back in the air heading out to Cabezon Peak. By now (10:30 am) it was VERY warm out, and I definitely felt the effects from the high density altitude on takeoff. I'd warned Richard that we probably would fly a few feet over the (7,400'-long) runway after takeoff to build speed in ground effect; that's exactly what we did, and it didn't phase him at all. Ditto the bumps from thermals rising off the desert floor.
(Another side effect of the heat: oil temps wanted to stay in the yellow range for most of the trip, requiring shallow climbs to altitude and throttling the Rotax back to 4,800 RPM to bring it back to the green.)
Our return to Santa Fe was also uneventful, though I wouldn't have wanted to have been in the air in a small plane much later than we were. In addition to the increasingly bumpy ride, by 12:00 thunderheads had also started to build over the Jemez west of the airport, and to the east (a good 30 miles from the field) there were more clouds with wisps of virga coming down. I pointed them out to Richard, and told him we wouldn't be coming anywhere close to those.
I capped the flight with a nice short-field landing at the Tower's request, so we could clear the runway in time to allow a (much faster) T-28 behind us to land.
All in all, the flight was another great experience, as well as a wonderful confidence builder. We had a few very minor challenges along the way, most of which were completely transparent to my passenger. The grin on his face said it all.
One last thing - By a fortunate stroke of fate, the Skyhawk I took a "Discovery Flight" in waaaay back in April 2003 - N606DB - wound up parked next to the Remos while Richard and I ate breakfast. A nice bit of symmetry, that.
In the week between Mom's flight and this past Saturday, I also moved to a new house; I was still hauling boxes over to the new house the night before the flight. At several points on our way to the airport I asked myself, "are you up to this?" Each time, my honest answer was the same: I'm rested and alert, I'm focused on the task at hand, and I am really looking forward to taking my friend up for his first ride on a small plane. (I had warned Richard that we would not be going if I couldn't honestly say those things.)
The flight from SAF to AEG was a great "first" experience for my passenger - the air was smooth and all went to plan. This was my first time flying into Double Eagle, but traffic was light and the tower cleared us to land before we were established on downwind, so it was mostly uneventful.
I say "mostly" as I had a brief "d'oh!" moment when I realized I'd been setting up for a right downwind to runway 4 - a prominent strip of black asphalt visible from 30 miles away - instead of to the barely-visible concrete of runway 35. Fortunately, I caught my error well before it would have been a problem, thanks to my practice of setting the course bug to point towards the active runway (a tip I picked up from the plane's owner.)
After a fantastic landing (if I say so myself) and some great food at the Bombing Range Cafe, we were soon back in the air heading out to Cabezon Peak. By now (10:30 am) it was VERY warm out, and I definitely felt the effects from the high density altitude on takeoff. I'd warned Richard that we probably would fly a few feet over the (7,400'-long) runway after takeoff to build speed in ground effect; that's exactly what we did, and it didn't phase him at all. Ditto the bumps from thermals rising off the desert floor.
(Another side effect of the heat: oil temps wanted to stay in the yellow range for most of the trip, requiring shallow climbs to altitude and throttling the Rotax back to 4,800 RPM to bring it back to the green.)
Our return to Santa Fe was also uneventful, though I wouldn't have wanted to have been in the air in a small plane much later than we were. In addition to the increasingly bumpy ride, by 12:00 thunderheads had also started to build over the Jemez west of the airport, and to the east (a good 30 miles from the field) there were more clouds with wisps of virga coming down. I pointed them out to Richard, and told him we wouldn't be coming anywhere close to those.
I capped the flight with a nice short-field landing at the Tower's request, so we could clear the runway in time to allow a (much faster) T-28 behind us to land.
All in all, the flight was another great experience, as well as a wonderful confidence builder. We had a few very minor challenges along the way, most of which were completely transparent to my passenger. The grin on his face said it all.
One last thing - By a fortunate stroke of fate, the Skyhawk I took a "Discovery Flight" in waaaay back in April 2003 - N606DB - wound up parked next to the Remos while Richard and I ate breakfast. A nice bit of symmetry, that.
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