So now I'm back in the UK with a new job and a new log-in name due to difficulties logging-on as Long-EC from the computer at said new job.
I thought I would add my own experiences to the list of best places - maybe it will inspire someone.
I did a quick FAA PPL flight test (memorable moment - examiner says "I have control" directly above Lindberg -
thinks I, that's a fail isn't it? - plane goes into steep right turn - "look at the size of that [some wide body jet] compared to the others down there" and starts to tell me all about them)
Then off for three weeks in a PA28. First stop Lake Havasu for a quick squint at London Bridge, Kingman for fuel and parked airliners, Bagdad because you just have to and into Sedona in the sunset.
Ah Sedona, what an airport, more like an aircraft carrier in fact. Perched on the hilltop, hardly room for the airport, a cafe and a hotel. Surrounded by red mountains. 5 mins walk to the hotel, 5 mins back for dinner at the airport, 5 mins back to the pool. And good food too - especially after the culinary desert that is El Cajon.
A few turns over Meteor Crater, up to Canyon De Chelly (spectacular and worth the detour) and onto Farmington, NM (not) (and Mr Farmington ATC, I want to apologise for disturbing your slumber by having the temerity to actually ask to land at your public airport). Then up to Monument Valley for the sunset - and no National Park 2000ft dotted line either...
And back to Sedona for a night landing.
Sunset Crater the next day (so so) and on to Grand Canyon. Wow. The thing I like about the main US National Parks is that they totally live up to expectations. The sheer size of the thing and the depth are staggering - you thnk its just another canyon, but its just a different league. Its got to be seen. There is, of course, the turbulence and the time it takes a PA28 to get to the required 10,500ft crossing altitude at midday temperatures but that's part of the fun. I flew down to Grand Canyon West - you can go closer to the rim height at the west end of the canyon.
So I'm in GCW, intending to go back to Page but short on fuel. The options are Grand Canyon for fuel then Page or Kanab for something different. Or McCarran Intl, Las Vegas. Easy one that
What did ATC do before they had the Stratosphere Tower to make approach instructions easy? A night in Las Vegas always refreshes the parts other cities don't reach.
Next day, up over Zion National Park (good but should've landed and drove up) to Bryce Canyon. Top place - airport manager couldn't have been more helpful. I intended just to see the canyon then fly on but it is just so fantastic I spent too long so stayed the night at the hotel there. The hotel provides courtesy transport and the park has a shuttle bus system.
Then down to Marble Canyon (kind of between two cliffs) for a look at the Colorado River then onto Rainbow Bridge and back to Page. Its golf cart war there with two FBOs fighting for your business. Page is a nice place if you can get down to the lake shore.
Time to head south east. To Grants Milan - nothing there as such but you can hire a car there to go to Sky City, an Indian place on a mesa and that is worth the effort if only for the view, rather than the Indians. No video cameras allowed in the village - still, that's why we have planes
And so to Carlsbad, home of the Carlsbad Caverns in south east New Mexico. Biggest in the world (or at least western hemisphere or something). 2m bats come out at sunset and the place is
ing huge. Wookey Hole, eat your heart out. Not just a huge space, it was filled with massive versions of all sorts of stalactites and columns and soda straws etc.
Roswell - there is nothing there except the UFO place but its a bit like Bagdad, you feel you have to go. Actually the UFO place was interesting - I realised I'd flown over the crash site earlier.
I decided to stop in at Santa Fe to see some pueblo dwellings up at Los Alamos. (Thanks to Million Air for the courtesy car and the salsa). Taxiing off the runway at Santa Fe, I notice these jet fighters lined up on the apron. And I think of these little adverts that appear each month in Pilot with a guy called Larry standing in front of a Mig. Oh dear, its going to be an expensive stop
So the next day sees me in a flight suit and chute, being briefed on the plane and on basic aeros and strapped in the L-39 by a man with a middle name which has quotation marks round it, you know like "Jester" or "Maverick" or in this case "Duke". I wouldn't say I mastered the Russian taxying technique but we did get to the runway, took off and headed out to their box for some aeros and I discovered I quite liked "G" after all. Then back to the airport for a few circuits. Now I have some jet time in my logbook!
You can imagine that getting back in the cherokee after that was a bit demeaning but I had a great flight that afternoon. Up past Taos to the pass over the Rockies, over the pass at 11,500, then drop down over Pueblo and route round Denver, a quick stop for fuel at Sidney (small Colorado plains town), then up towards Alliance, Nebraska to spot Carhenge. (Think Stonehenge made of cars) Flying low over some badlands and on up to Rapid City, South Dakota.
Next day sees a visit by car to the Black Hills (v.nice indeed - added to the list of places I'd like to live) then up the Iron Mountain Road to Mount Rushmore. This road has a bunch of tunnels and each time you come out of a tunnel, you get a view of the distinguished gents. Its better from the road than the visitors centre really. The indians are making their own one, a carving of Crazy Horse (will be bigger than Rushmore obviously) which is also worth a look.
Then back to Rapid City, back into the plane and an evening flight north west to Deadwood and on to Devils Tower (Close Encounters of the Third Kind) whose dotted lines on the map are really very close into the tower so you can circle close. Didn't see any aliens but caught a headwind which slowed down my progress so I stopped in Sheridan.
Over the Bighorns to Cody, over the Rockies (I think) to Lake Yellowstone, south along the Grand Tetons to Jackson Hole and back north along the Grand Tetons in a car to Yellowstone, still partly snow covered. Evening cocktails on the terrace at the Old Faithfull Inn, followed by a day of more geysers and Japanese touristing (drive, stop, film, drive, stop, film (sometimes, drive and film together)) via Mammoth to Yellowstone Canyon. Beats the Grand in my opinion. So beautiful. There's a platform right on the top of the lower falls - the water flow was huge and the drop dizzing. I was going to go back to Jackson that evening till I saw the Lake Yellowstone hotel and decided to spend the night and take dinner overlooking the lake.
Next day, back to Jackson. My habit of asking the FSS for notams for my longest possible route for the day (on the basis that if I didn't fly all of it, it doesn't matter) caught me out as I asked for a VFR brief to Portland International. (VFR not allowed there)
It didn't matter anyway since as I crossed Idaho towards Boise, I decided to head north to McCall. I stopped for fuel and food at McCall - a really pretty town on a lake surrounded by mountains (added to the list too) which got me thinking I'd like to spend another night somewhere on a lake. So I headed north via a brief dalliance with more in-canyon entertainment at Hells Canyon to Sandpoint, Idaho which I can totally recommend as a night's stop. On a lake, surrounded by mountains, its got a beach. And boat hire.
Then headed for the San Juan Islands north of Seattle. On the way, above the clouds, you could see Mt Rainier sticking out in the distance. I'd been to the Canadian SJ's before in blue skies which the locals described as unusual. And it just got bluer this time. They rank No 1 on my list of places to live in the US. (A few other people have the same idea - I gather property is more expensive than Seattle). I flew around then found my definite "Best Place to Fly in the Western US" - East Sound on Orcas Island. Think Caribbean style hilly island with a runway on the only flat bit where the two sides of the horseshoe island meet. Fly up the sound, turn a little and land. Nice hotel too.
N33810 had some spark plug issues there. Where else in the world would you get your spark plugs fixed immediately and the mechanic stands you dinner?! Interesting guy too.
Over Whidbey Island, down the Puget Sound at 500 ft under the Bravo, into the bay up to the Space Needle (almost), Mount Rainier always visible, and south for a fly-by of Mt St Helens then west down the river to Astoria. South over the airport of "Seaside" - does exactly what it says on the tin - and along the gorgeous Oregon coast (all parts thereof on the list of places to live) then inland to Crater Lake. The rim was still snow covered, the sky was blue, no wind so the surface was unrippled - a great view from the plane. And down to Crescent City on the northern CA coast for the redwoods.
I took a car through the redwoods (looked just like in Star Wars), drove through one of those hollow trees, all in beautiful sunshine so got a bit of a shock when I turned the corner into Crescent City and it was fog bound. Which it remained for the next three days. I went wandering round Southern Oregon in a car which was OK but it was totally frustrating since the fog was only 1000ft thick or so and only went a little way inland. Eventually, I went back to Crescent City thinking about just going for it in the evening. I was about 20miles away in the car when I got an AWOS on the handheld that said 1200ft ceiling and I floored it. Reporting 1000ft at the airport but it was closing in quickly so I switched to CTAF and took off - and got over to the edge of the layer before it closed in.
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Merced seemed very busy on frequency when I got there - turned out I arrived in the middle of a vintage aircraft fly-in. I didn't win any prizes but I did manage to hire a car to get me to Yosemite that evening. Again, what can I say - the place lives up to expectations and more. Every turn is a new view and you want to go back and do that turn again but you can't because its a one-way system (as several drivers pointed out to me
). Japanese tourist day again then drove back to Merced and flew to Death Valley for the evening. At 13,800 over the Sierra Nevadas, I didn't breach the full-time oxygen rule but the 30 minute rule was maybe stretched a little. Landed 8.30pm, 42 degrees C, called the hotel and they sent a van. The Furnace Inn Ranch is an oasis in the middle of DV. They have this outdoor pool which is like having a hot bath. Being June, the only people there were British ("mad dogs and Englishmen") - pretty much the first I'd come across in any numbers the entire trip.
San Diego had been IFR that whole week and the next day was no different which meant I had no option but to spend the day at Big Bear playing on the lake. Its a hard life
. The following day was still cloudy but SEE was reporting above 1000ft so I tried a "VFR contact" approach - you follow I8, the cloud gets lower and the road gets higher and you try not to contact with the cars. Eventually, it was fairly clear I was going to breach a 500ft rule or two so I found another way, low over El Cap dam.
Three weeks, 70 hours flying, don't know how many thousand miles, all VFR and trying to use radio nav as little as possible (I only got lost once, which was when I tried to use it without keeping up a visual fix - lesson learned), a stack of cash (partly because of my insistence that any hotel had to have a pool and tub!) but a great adventure that will keep me boring friends for months to come.
I then had 4 weeks of hood work for the IR which was a bit more like hard work (but worth it if I never have to get stuck in Crescent f
ing City again). And a complex and cessna sign offs. 140 hours in 2 months 5 days took me up to 200 hours. I'm feeling chuffed.
Flying in the US makes flying fun. Every little town has a 5000ft tarmac runway (no looking for short grass fields surrounded by other grass fields), with an FBO to fuel up for you, sort you out a hotel room, give or rent you a car and tell you the best places to go see. I got cars after 9pm on a couple of occasions and on Sundays and from little airports (try doing that in the UK). I never booked a room in advance, in fact most times I only had the vaguest notion of where I would spend the night. Overall route planning was by the maps at the back of the Best Western hotel guide (before anyone objects, I had sectionals too). There's no PPR; if you get bored or tired or the weather closes in, you stop somewhere, if not, you can carry on. The FSS will brief you properly and en route too if you change your mind about a destination. The airspace is sensible and high enough to give you options. If we became the 51st state...
But most of all, the people are just so damn friendly and polite and helpful (except Farmington tower obviously) and just downright generous. We have a habit of mocking the US over many things and deploring creeping Americanisation but there are some things they just do right and we should learn. So thanks to all the people I met on this trip.
Phew - think I typed enough now - if anyone is doing anything similar, I hope this gives you ideas.
AF