This week, I flew my longest cross-countryyet. On Wednesday, I flew non-stop from Ottawa (CYOW) to Sault Ste. Marie (CYAM), just about 400 nm. Conditions were a little hazy, but the ceiling was high, and I was able to manage 6,500 feet the whole way. I stayed overnight at my grandmother's cottage not far from the airport fence (on Pointe-aux-Pins), then tried to fly home on Thursday. Unfortunately, the ceiling came down lower than forecast about an hour out of the Sault; I managed to establish myself at a low-but-comfortable 1500 feet AGL, 500 feet clear of clouds and well above all obstacles except for a big smokestack in Sudbury that I could see from 15 miles away (there was good visibility underneath), and managed to keep flying as far as North Bay (CYYB) with the expectation of continuing to Ottawa.
Just as I was coming to the east end of Lake Nipissing, the ceiling started coming down, and a helicopter coming from the east said it was bad that way as well. Normally in that situation, the smartest thing would have been to turn 180 degrees and head back to Sudbury, about 45 minutes behind me. Fortunately, however, at precisely that moment the North Bay airport was less than three miles off my left wing and I was already talking to the FSS, so I flew in and landed. By the time I touched down, the reported ceiling had plummited to 600 ft (about 1200 ft above surrounding terrain; CYYB is on a high hill). I spent the afternoon standing in the terminal staring at the sky, wondering how far out the low ceiling went, etc. I was frightened at how tempting it was to try to find a way out (especially since Ottawa was starting to report a lot of TCU and CB anyway), but I finally did the right thing in the end and took a motel room. The next morning (Friday), the weather was great, so I left at 7:15 local (no morning fog on the high hill) and flew the last 1:30 home at 5500 feet, ducking under an overcast layer just a few minutes out of Ottawa. Flying even an 800 nm round-trip cross-country is worth a lot more than dozens of short cross-countries around the same airspace; I'm planning longer ones soon. It's a lot of fun, but I feel even more motivated to finish my IFR rating (though it wouldn't have helped on Thursday with the embedded CB and TCU). Here are some pictures. The quality's not great because of a combination of a cheap camera, dirty windows, hazy air, and a need to concentrate on flying the plane (I didn't usually look through the viewfinder): http://www.megginson.com/private/2003-05-28-soo-trip/ All the best, David -- David Megginson, [EMAIL PROTECTED], http://www.megginson.com/ _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel