Last year we departed Oshkosh to the west to visit with my brother and his family who live in Golden Colorado. We cut out a day early and left the show wanting more.
Determined not to do that again we decided Tuesday Morning that were were staying at Airventure until Thursday which would make it a 7 day trip. It would also deplete the contents of our coolers making them an acceptable weight to fly with again. We woke up Wednesday and made our agenda of things we needed to see and people we had to say good by to.
One of the items on our list was to find a computer with reliable internet access and get a STMP slot reservation to fly IFR from the show. We've done that before and it really does simplify the departure. Depending on the weather it can take a lot of time to get released - but generally it is a lot safer as you get the whole runway to yourself and don't have to fly the departure procedure. You can also be a little less vigilent about scanning for traffic departing from what the notam descibes as 'Having the highest concentration of aircraft anywhere in the world'
I got a reservation for Thursday AM at 1430Z (930 CDT) from OSH to Buffalo and everything that I had heard from the FSS briefers and looked at online made that seemed like a good play.
While finishing our list we were invited to a Louisiana Shrimp Boil that Jerry from Texas (flys in his 206) does every year. We met Jerry 8 years ago when we shared a row with him. He always anchors the showside end of the row next to the handicapped aircraft parking area. Some say that he is the person who cuts the hole in the fence so you can walk to the bathrooms without having to climb over/limbo under it in the morning. We've taken to riding back from the Pick and Save with Jerry-usually bumping into him when we are shopping or checking out. Even though he is a phenominal cook (and brings a 128 quart cooler filled with Gulf Seafood packed in dry ice-gotta love the Cessna 206) we decided to cook our remaining food, have dinner alone then pack up and prepare for our departure.
Thursday AM I had to fight to stay in bed until 6AM local knowing full well we were going to have a long day of flying. It was wet with dew when we awoke so we were grateful that the only things that were not in the plane already was the tent airmatress, sleeping bags and our clothes.
We had fruit for breakfast and I checked with the field side FSS for an update to the briefing we received via cell phone on awakening. The 7AM (CDT) change to the forecast was the frontal boundary that was supposed to be south and east of our planned couse was moving slower than expected and we would risk the chance of convective activity at Buffalo and eastward should we wait to use our 930 slot.
I amended our plan preferring to get out and stay in good weather so we tossed the IFR idea and put the VFR sign in the window. We said goodbyes to everyone around and got ready to go but needed help pulling the plane out of our spot as it had sunk an inch under the long grass.
Judy's logs show a start time of 9AM Eastern and a takeoff time of 9:10 so we left an hour and a half earlier than planned hoping that would make the difference with the heat of the day frontal boundaries and convective activity.
After leaving we headed straight out at 1300 per the procedure until we were clear of the delta airspace. The Garmin clearly depicts that but it was easier to see the boundary by the course changes the airplanes we were flying in trail of were making. Once outside we initiated a course change direct to Falls VOR to join V510 to Muskegon. We called Green Bay radio on the lake crossing frequency and asked for the lake crossing service. I had never done this before, preferring to file and fly IFR whenever we are out of our home area.
The specialist was kind and forgiving of the fact I had not already filed. Even with the tremendous workload of Airventure he explained and walked me thru process which esentially is a VFR flight plan that starts when you are 'feet wet' over the departure end and is closed when you are 'feet dry' on the other side. You have to call them every 10 minutes and they miss you for 15 minutes the Coast Guard scrambles and comes out looking. I think its more for peace of mind - you feel someone is looking out for you. The water in Lake Michigan never really gets above 50 degrees and is over 500' deep in the center so if you survive the ditching, you're not going to last very long in the cold water.
I asked the specialist what altitudes most people cross at and he suggested going as high as we could to increase our glide range should we lose the engine. We went up to 11500 and at that altiture we were rewarded with 180Kt ground speed. Once we cleared the shoreline we gave them a PIREP and closed the lake crossing plan. We thanked them and aksed for a frequency for flight following and was given Muskegon Approach if were were going to decend or Chicago Center if we were staying up high.
We elected to stay up high as we were getting a great tailwind so checking on with Chicago I asked for flight following to our destination and gave him our route of flight to BUF. I usually do this so when I get handed off to the next sector they have the routing and then I aks the next guy to convert it to IFR. This saves me the hassel of doing it with the FSS on the radio but Chicago was having none of it. They handed me off to Cleveland center who told me to file and report back up with them.
I filed from Flint Michigan to Serena NDB, London Ontario then Victor 84 to Buffalo @ 11K. While I'm writing this stiuff down I notice an oily spot on the throttle quadrant. I start to get a little excited then realize there is nothing that could be leaking fluid onto there. I looked up and noticed the whisky compass had a drop of fluid coming off of it so we grabbed a paper towel and wiped it up. Now that we were filed and in the system we gave a PIREP to the FSS people and changed back to Clevland and reported in with them. The read me the clearance (as filed) and decended us to 11K.
We encoundtered the weather from the trailing side of the front around Serena Ontario (South of Lake Huron) and it presented itself as a scattered to broken layer from around 4000 to about 9000.
Changed over to Toronto Center we were 'RADAR Identified' and stayed with them for a while. He changed us over to another TC controller at 125 'decimal' 75. Those little differences reminded me that we were in a different nation, and I was glad to be on an IFR plan as I remembered Edward Fergeson (Oshkosh Mooney friend from Ottawa) telling us that VFR on top had different rules in Canada than the US.
About 20 minutes later it got quiet so we queried the controller three times with both radios, and received no reponse. I assumed we had lost radio contact with Toronto. Switching back to our last assigned frequency we received a response right away. He told me he'd check and called them on the phone. They came back on and told me to try the other frequency again.
After switching I called and got a booming reponse right away. The controller asked me what my request was. I replied that we had no request but were unfamiliar with the quiet and concenred our radios had failed. He said that seeing it was lunchtime and he was only working me he had turned down the speaker, I can only assume to enjoy his lunch. Once again, it ain't Kansas up there.
We decended into Buffalo and they kept us high until over Niagra so we had to get decent vectors down to the initial @ 2500' We did the ILS 23 approach and let the autopilot track it so we could see how it did in decent weather to have confidence in it in bad. The AP was having a difficult time so I took over and realized how windy it was. Looking at the Garmin/XM we realized we had crossed the front back at Niagra/St Catherines area and now were ahead of a Cold Front in warm unstable air. Landing was uneventful and we taxiied into Prior ate luch and had them fill us up with $6.70 100LL.
Once lunch was done we decided that the Victor two route we always take was not good as the convection had started and the radar returns were red and yellow from Syracuse thru Utica and on into Albany. We went instead thru Elmira, then Lake Henry, and did the Valre arrival into DXR. Takeoff was a challange as the winds were steady at 19 gusting 25. We were cleared on course, climbed to 5000 and had the low level turbulence up till 4000. At 5K we were in and out of the clouds a bit until we hit Elmira where we made the turn and as we continued it opened up. We were cleared direct Valre and then vectored to the initial for the VOR A approach into Danbury. We shutdown at 4:10 after starting in Oshkosh at 9AM for a 7 hour trip with an hour fuel and lunch stop. for a total elapsed time of 13.7 hours on the tach.
Yahoo! That's the way its supposed to work.
