Flying Summers Brothers

Most likely, this is our penultimate family trip in the little plane. Rudy will start college after next summer and will almost certainly have his own plans each summer. Dexter has already started down that path and our departure from Santa Monica was delayed because he was in a Shakespeare program in Topanga Canyon which he loved. We tried to work out all sorts of different permutations to get the plane across the country where we could use it to hop around, but in the end we just had a shorter vacation and all got to enjoy Dexter’s turn as Laertes. Continue reading →

Above the Clouds

With the plane on the ground in Albany, we waited for the word that the alternator had been replaced and it was back in good running condition. We had a rental car and the drive from Pleasant Lake back to Albany was three hours. Nell had driven us to New Hampshire, which was a nice break for this pilot, and on the return trip I thought about a question she had asked, “Which is more difficult, a long drive or a long flight?”

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Two hours later…

Some people have the little gas powered tow bars, some people have the fancy new electric ones. Adam is really smart and has the sort that can learn how to pull the plane out of the hangar with no guidance at all and will eventually take the plane up for a test flight.

Found Afloat

At the Parry Sound, Ontario airport, where we land every summer, there is an aircraft company. The Found Aircraft company has been building planes since the 1940s. I had always heard they were heavy, ungainly, and climbed a lot like a brick that had been heaved into the sky. They are also apparently quite rugged, which is nice in Alaska where you run into things like trees, gravel banks, and bears.

Adam spotted this one close to home.

Adam spotted a World Cruiser on the ground in Seattle. He’s been seeing some good stuff up there in the Pacific Northwet.

The Seattle II

Back in November 2011 I wrote about having an electrical system failure as I landed at Long Beach Airport with my friend Susan. We never found the cause for the loss of power to the system, and it was likely that it was me forgetting to switch on the main switch for the alternator, or bumping the switch as we were flying down from Santa Monica. Continue reading →

Guppy and Whale

That’s Adam’s plane in front of a C-130, a military transport plane. I’m pretty sure the C-130 uses more fuel to taxi to the runway than Adam’s plane can hold in the wing tanks.

Beech Starship

Adam spotted this Beech Starship. They were a disaster for the airplane manufacturer and we had no idea any were left flying. The incarnation I like is the Piaggio.