Today was my second day of flying in my venture to return to the hobby. This time, it was out to Beale Air Force Base, where they have a nice field loaded with nothing but sky.

The following three photos pan from left to right along the flight line. The airplane in the photos is not mine, and the fact that it is in all three pictures is purely accidental, as I we merely trying to capture the site.





It was a sunny, cloudless day...but it was windy. The forecast said 5MPH winds gusting to 10MPH, but it was quite a bit stronger than that at times. And, it was choppy - very choppy. Gusts would come unexpectedly, and there was nothing steady about the wind - not even its direction. The windsock was blowing straight horizontal at times, an I believe it was a 20MPH windsock.

When I arrived at the field, the wind was blowing pretty much straight down the runway. But shortly afterward, it shifted a bit, cutting across the runway at about 45 degrees - sometimes more.

If you want to hear a group of guys get together and complain, get a group of R/C pilots out on the field on a windy day. Wah, wah, wah! Despite the complaints, some of them flew, anyway. Most of them, actually. Surprisingly, I didn't see a single serious mishap today, whereas the grassy knoll flying excursion a couple days ago, in the evening with absolutely no breeze to speak of, at least four planes went down in pieces.

I flew today without a single complaint about the wind. I like flying in the wind. And what better way to get my thumbs back? I flew several times during the day, until my transmitter batteries began to dip, and I landed a couple of times in the weeds (once because a gust of wind blew me off of my approach pattern just before touchdown, and once because I just wanted to get the plane down with all the commotion going on - there were too many planes in the air, and I don't like to fly with a lot of other planes in the air.

But I did a couple of touch-and-go's, and got in a pretty smooth landing or two. I'm still a little rusty, so don't have my polish back (I'm no longer one with my airplane...but I will be one day soon). But, once again, my airplane returned home in one piece, no worse for wear, and ready to go again. Another successful day of flying.



I think the crowning moment of the day was when, at one point, some of the guys were hanging around my table, and one of them uttered the memorable phrase of the day: "you have no ailerons!"

Here I am, the new guy at the field, who hasn't really flown in four years, showing up at a flying club with an old beater airplane built in 1983, and I'm flying among the top flyers of the club on a windy day, making cross-wind landings with only three channels.

Again, I didn't get any pictures of me in the air, but that's because it's hard to work a camera and an R/C transmitter at the same time. It's also because when I get to flying, I don't think to ask someone to take pictures for me. But I'll work that out on future missions.

It looks like I'm going to join this club. It beats the other field. I might join that other club as well, just because it offers night flying, but I think I'll wait on that until I get a night flying plane together. It won't be long before I'm ready to fly at night again, but I still don't have my routine back, yet, and that's a personal requirement before I go night flying again.

Just remind me to bring the sun screen next time I go flying during the day. I got a little red. Oops!

I scoped out a couple of other unofficial potential flying spots on my way home from the field, but nothing really panned out. There was a place by the river that I was hoping would work, but it just wasn't quite suitable for take-offs and landings. Otherwise, it would have been a fun place to fly.

The other place I looked at turned out to be a farm with lots of horses around, so I figured that wouldn't work out too well. I wanted to check one other place, but I didn't have enough gas to get down there - I had just enough to get to the gas station, and I didn't want to turn around to go all the way back. But I'll check it at some point. There just aren't many potential places to fly out here, and I've been scanning Google maps in search of a place for quite some time now. It looks like maybe the flying clubs are the only real viable places. But I'm determined to find something. However, I am convinced I have to come out of the mountains to have any hope at all -- unless I want to build a sea plane and fly off a lake. There's lots of those around.

Well, my airplane and I are back home safely, and now I think it's time for me to take a shower. Too bad - it looks like the wind has stopped. I wouldn't mind shooting some touch-and-go's. Oh, well - that's what next time is for.
- posted by Bill @ 5:29 PM