Sat Sep 12, 2015 1:04 am
#1404287
Taylorcraft Tour West
To cut a very long story short, I bought a Taylorcraft in the States to join Jim and Mike on a tour of the western USA to help Jim complete flying in every State in the lower 48. This is in memory of our friend the late Lee Bowden, who was Jim's flying companion for many trips, and they missed flying in only six of the contiguous States. This trip was to finish that tally.
My new steed:
and Mike's new steed, again bought especially for the trip:
The trip started from Dacy, Illinois (0C0) with just Mike & I.
We met up with Jim at the annual AAA fly-in at Blakesburg, Iowa. From there, we went to Jim's airport where we carried out some pre-trip maintenance and had a respite from the 90-plus temps of Blakesburg:
From there to Spearfish South Dakota.
En route we stopped at Wall (of drug store fame), where we enjoyed some hilarity:
More to follow when internet access allows.
Friday 11th September
Wednesday we hired a car and spent the day largely driving around the Black Hills. Some touristy silliness was mandatory:
but an impromptu evening flight saw us overfly the placed we had visited by road:
Leaving Spearfish on Thursday morning, we flew past Devil's Tower:
before heading south-west to Rawlins, Wyoming. There were some vast open-cast coal mines on the way:
Rawlins would be one of the highest elevation fields for us at 6800' or so. DA on our day was 9500' (good thing it has a 10,000 ft runway!
A further brief fuel stop at Rock Springs saw us west-bound for the high stuff for our destination of Brigham City, Utah. We needed to climb to 10,000 feet or so to maintain a safe clearance, and with a stiff headwind and being at about gross weight and with only 65hp and no mixture control, this took us some time! (Oil temp a bit high too!)
Brigham City:
Today, Friday, we had another glorious day, with clear skies and a slight tailwind for the two-stop trip from Brigham City to Mountain Home for fuel and then an overnight at Dry Creek air park, staying with friends of Lee & Linda Bowden.
More to follow as further internet access allows.
To cut a very long story short, I bought a Taylorcraft in the States to join Jim and Mike on a tour of the western USA to help Jim complete flying in every State in the lower 48. This is in memory of our friend the late Lee Bowden, who was Jim's flying companion for many trips, and they missed flying in only six of the contiguous States. This trip was to finish that tally.
My new steed:
and Mike's new steed, again bought especially for the trip:
The trip started from Dacy, Illinois (0C0) with just Mike & I.
We met up with Jim at the annual AAA fly-in at Blakesburg, Iowa. From there, we went to Jim's airport where we carried out some pre-trip maintenance and had a respite from the 90-plus temps of Blakesburg:
From there to Spearfish South Dakota.
En route we stopped at Wall (of drug store fame), where we enjoyed some hilarity:
More to follow when internet access allows.
Friday 11th September
Wednesday we hired a car and spent the day largely driving around the Black Hills. Some touristy silliness was mandatory:
but an impromptu evening flight saw us overfly the placed we had visited by road:
Leaving Spearfish on Thursday morning, we flew past Devil's Tower:
before heading south-west to Rawlins, Wyoming. There were some vast open-cast coal mines on the way:
Rawlins would be one of the highest elevation fields for us at 6800' or so. DA on our day was 9500' (good thing it has a 10,000 ft runway!
A further brief fuel stop at Rock Springs saw us west-bound for the high stuff for our destination of Brigham City, Utah. We needed to climb to 10,000 feet or so to maintain a safe clearance, and with a stiff headwind and being at about gross weight and with only 65hp and no mixture control, this took us some time! (Oil temp a bit high too!)
Brigham City:
Today, Friday, we had another glorious day, with clear skies and a slight tailwind for the two-stop trip from Brigham City to Mountain Home for fuel and then an overnight at Dry Creek air park, staying with friends of Lee & Linda Bowden.
More to follow as further internet access allows.
Last edited by Rob L on Sat Sep 12, 2015 2:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Miscellaneous liked this