No horizon? No problem.

Today's short flight turned into a small exercise in navigation. With no GPS on board I took off with the plan to go to Newport News for a few touch and goes.

At 2000' the haze was quite severe. I could see the ground for only about 10 miles out and had no horizon. This made it like a partial IFR flight. Since I could see the ground the potential for getting disoriented was small though (compared to real IMC flying).

I pulled out the sectional and found a nearby landmark that I could use to identify myself to the tower as I approached. I ended up using "dead fleet" as my landmark.

I made my touch and goes and then headed back to JGG. On the way I saw what looked like a small runway with X's on each end. It seemed kind of short, but I was wondering if it had once been a small private airport that had been closed up. However, after a few seconds I noticed a small white object flying down near the runway. I then realized I was looking at an RC airport. Pretty neat. I watched the little plane fly for a few seconds before moving on towards home.

I encountered some light drizzle on the way back and had to descend to 1500 to keep away from some low clouds. I used the descent as an excuse to try out "minimum trim glide" that I recently read about. That worked fairly well though the trim wheel was not happy being trimmed that nose-high - it was hard to turn the trim wheel after a little bit but never felt like it hit a "stop".

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