Great Trip to San Diego...

Another wonderful flying day!!  Woke up early and found the typical layer in the Santa Ynez  valley wasn’t there. After checking the weather I found San Diego was overcast again!  “Well I’ll wait and see what happens” Thankful the weather in San Diego improved so Dad took me down to the airport, I was headed back to San Diego.   To our surprise the bees were still hanging on the plane and weren’t leaving.  So I started the plane up and blew them off, as I headed over to the self service fuel pumps.   After thanking Dad, I was headed back to San Diego.  The climb over the mountain was interesting, the performance wasn’t great due to the heat and the mild turbulence made for a fun trip.  Soon I checked in with SoCal approach to get some flight following.   Soon I was headed to Palmdale and Victorville. 

Palmdale

As I approached Victorville, ( Southern California Logistics Center)  SoCal was kind enough to advise me not to land due to the winds blowing 330degrees at 20 knots gusting to 30. Yikes.. much higher then my 12 knot limit. Air traffic controllers have been getting a lot of bad press lately, but I have nothing but great things to say.  True professionals!    As I approached Victorville, I could see what looked like a thick cloud layer south of the Cajon Pass in the LA Basin.  So I parked myself over Victorville at 9500' taking some photos as I called Flight Watch to get a weather check.  I was concerned the weather had blown in after I left, blocking my ground view to San Diego.  I was reassured it was just haze, and things were fine.  

Victorville.. aka Civilian Airline Boneyard

 After getting a couple of photos of the civilian airliner boneyard, I headed south.  As I flew over the California Speedway, the controller asked me to go to direct to my next VOR.  That began my “winging it” navigation.  Thankfully my organized charts helped.  Soon I was passing Palomar Observatory, sweet I’m in my home territory again!   With the upcoming weekend holiday, Marine Corp Air Station Miramar was closed so I was given the rare Class B transition over Miramar.  I choose not to take the short cut to get a little more time, but again the controllers were awesome.  Soon I was touching down on 28L at Montgomery.    After a brief chat with Brett,(letting him know I was back) I headed to lunch. Unfortunately, the wind picked up while I was at lunch, so I was done for the day.  Darn!  

Tomorrow is another training day with Brett, and more practice for me.  If the winds calm down I’ll head out on another longer cross country trip on Sunday.  I’m hoping to go to Sedona, AZ for six more hours of time.  As of today, I need 14.9hrs to meet my cross country time for ATP. Come on good weather.

7 days til the practical and oral test.. Yikes, just a little nervous.