What a Day!
Posted: Mon Apr 28, 2003 8:59 pm
Sunday - April 27th I woke up early and noticed it had the makings
of a great day outside, so I headed up to the airport. Got up to
Thomasville about 8:00 and rolled the Gull out of the hangar and pre-
flighted. It was gorgeous out with little wind. Wasn't sure what I
wanted to do, but since I had some friends participating in the
sailing regatta going on down at Shell Point, I decided to head down
there and do a fly by and come back. I got into the air a little
after 8:30 or so and headed in the general direction of Shell Point.
It was a bit hazy and I finally did pick up the 3 big towers just
south of Thomasville, then I decided to check out one of the grass
strips down by Lake Miccosukee that I could never find from the
ground. I wanted to scout the area and see about some land and who I
needed to talk to about the use of the strip down the road or even if
it was a possible option or not. I could not believe after flying
over it that I had actually been all around it and had never found
it. It is not easily seen from the ground. I then headed on toward
Shell Point. At this time I connected with a couple of friends from
Panama City by radio. They were headed up toward Mariana. After
finding out I was going toward the Beach, they decided it was such a
purty day that maybe they would just turn around and do a Beach Run
and meet me at Panacea. I told themn I would see them there.
Got down to Shell Point, flew low over the water by the beach and
ogled at the girls, I mean the boats and then headed over toward
Panacea. The other group was coming up on St Vincent's at the same
time, so I veered off toward Alligator Point and we now decided to
meet at Dog Island.
Once over Dog island I just kind of kept going on over to St Georges
Island and finally we met at the bridge going over to St George from
the mainland. I did a 180 after they flew by and joined them going
down the beach. What a mix of planes. There I was in my Gull (HKS),
along with a Fergy IIB (Rotax 582), a Rans S-12 (Rotax 503), and a
Challenger I CW (Rotax 503). We landed at Dog Island where one of
the guys put a little more fuel into his plane he was carrying an
extra 5 gal container with him. We then decided to go to
Apalachicola to refuel, so off we went back down the beaches. The
water seemed to be churned up a bit more than normal and not as
clear, however there were many schools of dolphins swimming about.
The scenery was great as ever. Someone mentioned that as many times
as we have flown the beaches it always seems just like the first
time. Over Little St George we went down to about 5-30 feet above
the beach and it was just as smooth as could be. When we came upon
the lighthouse I was surprise to see the water right up to its edge.
Boy, you sure can see the erosion that is going on out there. I
wonder what it will be like in another few years. This same light
house was about 5-600 yards from the water just about 7-8 years ago.
At the point here, we turned northwesterly toward St Vincent. Just
before crossing St Vincent's we gained some altitude and skirted the
inward side of the island and headed across the bay to Apalachicola.
During this part of the run one of the guys had some engine trouble
and decided to head for home. We kept in radio contact with him as
he headed to the barn. That left just 3 of us. After refueling at
Apalachicola, we decided it was time to eat, so we headed up to Grand
Ridge to a private strip up there (about 60 miles north of where we
were) and then to a place called Blondie's for lunch.
On the way I climbed up to about 4800 feet and was skimming the tops
of the broken clouds. What a beautiful site this was, and it was also
a lot smoother up there. Along the way, up near Blountstown, a guy
with a true Birddog called out to us and then later met us at Grand
Ridge. He even had the racks for the rocket launchers on that
plane. It was a very nicely done plane. He joined us for lunch.
Also a couple of more guys joined us (another Challenger to replace
the one that had headed to the barn and a Kolb) and now we had us a
convoy.
After taking off from Grand Ridge after lunch, I parted company with
these guys a little north of Lake Seminole and headed back for
Thomasville. The air was a little rough at this time but it wasn't
too bad a flight back home and once home I realized I had had a full
day and it was time to put the little birdie back in its nest. My
numbers for the day were 394 miles flown in 5.8 hours and using 11.6
gal of fuel. That's basically 34 mpg and 2.0 gph. Had a max speed
of 100 and an average speed of 71.4. It had turned out to be a great
day of flying and to top it off, today was totally impromptu. Not a
one of us ended up where we started out to, but it was just a whole
lot of fun.
Take care and Happy Flying - Jim C