First weekend trip

This weekend I took my first overnight flight trip. I flew down to KUZA to visit with the parents and sister. The flight there and back worked out nicely. I went VFR both ways - 6500' to KUZA and 7500' back to KJGG [Google Earth GPS track].

I think that was the highest I have ever piloted an airplane. During both trips I was just above the cloud tops (broken layers) and above the haze and rough air. Since I didn't have an autopilot I made the best of the situation - I made dodging cloud tops a little game. I would pick a valley in the clouds to fly to in order to maintain my heading and dodge any updrafts that were trying to raise a cloud in my way. This gave my flight path a few wiggles now and then (as did the heavy wing when I was operating from a single fuel tank above 5000’).

I was impressed by the fact that 7500' really does look pretty high when you look down at the cars and buildings. They are really, really tiny from that height. There were a few nice things about being up high: air so cold I had to close the vents, the ability to glide some 12 miles if I lost the engine, and very smooth air.

I made good use of flight following in both directions. They were very accommodating though I turned out to not be much trouble - they only needed to call out traffic once on each flight. Charlotte didn't want me going through their class B airspace but avoiding it only added a minute or two to the flight time so I was happy to oblige.

The airplane performed well for the weekend and taking the dog (Lynk) with me worked out just fine. He didn’t like the engine noise at first but got used to it in about the first 10 minutes. Whenever I would do any significant banking or engine power changes he would hop up from the rear floorboard, where he was sleeping, to take in the sights from the rear bench seat.

My sister took some pictures on one of the flights I made this weekend as well.

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