I'm now a private pilot!

Ah, that last blog post smell ... today was the day!

At the last minute 9UL became available, so I scrambled to reserve it and get a checkride scheduled. Everything fell into place perfectly, so this morning at 10 am I was at the airport with Stephen, ready to go. Cumulus clouds towered into the sky, portending a bumpy ride. We took off and headed north for Gnoss. Low-level clouds meant that I enjoyed a flight over Oakland at only 1,000 feet above the ground. I may have to fly my departures like this all the time.

Over San Pablo the sky was clear and I climbed to 3,000 feet and prepared to enter the pattern at Gnoss. Stephen talked me through the best strategy for doing it, and I pulled it off reasonably well, making a short-field landing. I then departed for Sonoma Valley, an airport I had never been to.

Sonoma Valley Airport was just over a ridge of hills. Its runway is so small that I had to make two entries, as I lost sight of it the first time. When I turned final, I truly realized just how pencil-thin the runway was.

"Wow ... that's a hell of a runway," I couldn't help but say. Stephen told me to show him a go-around, and I was somewhat relieved. We then departed for Petaluma, where I made another good pattern entry, landed, and taxied to parking. We grabbed a bite to eat at the Two-Niner Diner, chatted about all things aviation (including the future of the Alameda Aero Club, which unfortunately looks bleak), then returned to the plane to depart. I got a weather briefing over the phone; the briefer said that low-level clouds were obscuring hills and mountains, and he didn't recommend VFR flight. Stephen said we'd be fine.

As we flew over Santa Rosa on the way to Healdsburg, it looked like he was right: The clouds were 2,500 feet off the ground and well clear of any hills. Due to a misunderstanding, I accidentally busted Santa Rosa's airspace. Stephen wasn't pleased. I got to enjoy a picturesque final approach at Healdsburg again, even if it was a bumpy one, then took off for Cloverdale. At Cloverdale I practiced the pattern entry one more time, then demonstrated my new "aeronautical decision-making skills" to Stephen by telling him I felt fatigued, and it was time to go back. He was mightily pleased that I was able to recognize it now, instead of just ignoring it.

Santa Rosa's runway 14 was out for maintenance, so Tower was scrambling to fit everyone on runway 19. I made a short-field landing and taxied off at the first exit to the Jet Center, where this time we let the attendants fuel the plane, instead of doing it ourselves. Since we were hours early, Stephen and I retired in the pilot's lounge and fell asleep on their big, cushy chairs. Commercial pilots do a lot of waiting around when they're not flying, and don't get a whole lot of sleep, so every FBO generally has a place where they can wait and/or sleep. This one had a nice little board games collection, which was promptly ignored to get some Z's. The sleep helped clear my mind and prepare myself for the checkride.

When Steve did arrive, he was clearly in a big hurry. We rushed through the paperwork, and he told me to preflight expediently while he kept a casual eye on me. He said we didn't have a lot to do, so we'd just fly to Healdsburg, do a landing, then come back and call it a checkride. Who can disagree with that?

Ground gave me clearance to taxi to runway 19, where I did my takeoff. I had forgotten that it was supposed to be a soft-field takeoff, and of course Steve isn't allowed to help me out, so I kind of fudged it and transitioned into a soft-field takeoff as I rolled down the runway. He seemed to buy it though.

I did my best to stay calm and in control as I made my northward departure. Steve was looking everywhere. I remember Tuesday he told me to "use your people skills and keep an eye on your examiner. If he looks scared, you know you're doing something wrong." The problem is, when Steve cranes his neck to look every which way, it's hard to tell if it's fear or just vigilance. In this case it was merely vigilance, but I worried. Since Santa Rosa was busy, there were a lot of planes nearby, and honestly I think I sort of lost my situational awareness for a while on climb-out, but we managed to get out without almost hitting anyone.

I descended into Healdsburg, crossed over the field, then headed southeast of the field to prepare for a long, easy, slow entry into the pattern. I had no intention of rushing it. Steve stopped me before I'd barely begun, though, and said, "OK, you know what you're doing. Let's get out of here." So, I departed the pattern and gave Santa Rosa a call again.

"Skyhawk 739UL, Santa Rosa tower, remain clear of class-delta for now, we got guys working the runways, they're gonna shut the runways down for about 10 minutes, I'll get you your landing clearance after that." It was an unusual radio call.

With 10 minutes to kill, Steve said, "Give me the controls. Want a tour? I love to fly." I let him take control of the plane, and he took me over wine country, pointing out local rivers and lakes. He was eager to float over countryside and clearly loved his hometown.

"I'm not sure if this is a good idea, or not ... but can I ask you a question?"
"Sure, anything."
"Do you promise you didn't cut my checkride short because I screwed something up?" Honestly, I was pretty worried that was the case.
Steve laughed. "No, you did great. Were you worried?"
"Well, my soft-field..." I didn't want to admit I knew that I did it wrong, because Steve would be forced to assess that. Fortunately, Steve had already come to a different conclusion. "Yeah, you gotta work with what the control tower gives you. I know you'd do a perfect soft-field takeoff if tower had let you."

Whew. Yeah, I like that. It's the control tower's fault. I can go with that.

Tower gave us permission to land, and Steve continued to fly the plane right up to the airport, where he gave it back to me and asked me to do a soft-field landing. Tower, however, asked me to do a short-field landing. Steve was not content to let tower override him again, so he had a simple solution: "Make it both a short- and soft-field landing." Yeah, alright.

I came into the runway behind a Bonanza, but at 250 feet or so above the runway Tower told me to go around. Steve immediately seized the opportunity and watched me like a hawk as I performed the go-around procedure. Fortunately I did it fine, and re-entered the pattern for a second landing. Steve and I had no idea why Tower wanted us to go around, but whatever. Steve didn't mind the opportunity for a real-life test.

So I made my short-and-soft-field landing on 19 eventually, and taxied back to the Jet Center. Steve signed my logbook, gave me my temporary certificate and a kitschy little placard, said a quick congratulations, and was on his way. He obviously wanted to get home, but he did mention he was proud. I grabbed Stephen, still in the pilot's lounge.

"I'm a pilot. Let's get out of here." He shook my hand and congratulated me. Stephen had been listening to me over the radio and was surprised at how short the checkride was. I told him that Steve burned through it.

I flew back with Stephen, a nice leisurely flight over the North Bay down to Oakland. Stephen offered one last lesson for me.

"Want me to show you how to land on 33?" I had been wanting this lesson for a while.

"Definitely."

So we got our clearance to land on 33. Stephen talked me through the process. I made a low pass over 27R at 200 feet or so, then turned final to 33 and landed right next to the Old T's. It was quite a dramatic landing, and a great way to finish my last day as a student pilot and my first day as a private pilot.

I thanked Stephen for all the instructing I did, and said I'd see him around. I want to get my instrument rating next, after I've had a few months' rest and flying just for fun ... but I probably won't blog that. Writing these posts has been fun, but it's enough to do it once.

And here we have it. The complete record, from sim jockey to private pilot, in 5 months. I hope you enjoyed reading about it. If there's any one piece of advice I can give you, no matter who you are, it would be to follow your dreams.

I don't believe in Heaven, and I feel that this life on Earth is the only life we've got. I would have never forgiven myself if I were on my deathbed without a pilot's license. So, if you have the time and money, I urge you to follow your dreams as well, because you will not get a second chance.

And finally ... give me a call if you want to go flying!!

Total Cost: $10,968.42
Total Time: 174 days (5 and a half months)
Total Hours: 65.6
Total Flights: 40

An e-mail from Stephen

Tim,

We have reached the point where the AAC only has one active plane. This leads me to point out to you another alternative for finishing up. I have hesitated to mention this because I wanted to be the instructor who signed you off, but the ridiculous situation at the AAC leaves me no alternative.

You could contact North Coast Aviation at STS, where Benedict has his office, and explain your situation to them. They would probably have an instructor who would be willing to instruct you on the pattern entry procedures and then sign you off for your checkride. You might be able to arrange it so that they instruct you in the morning and you do the checkride in the afternoon. You'd have to figure out how to get yourself to STS.

You may be interested to know that the present situation has convinced me what I have long suspected -- that I will not be able to build my flight training business around the AAC planes. I have been looking for a couple of 152s for over a year, and once I acquire them, I will be doing little instructing at the AAC.

Good luck!

Stephen

No, I didn't pass my checkride

Let's get that out of the way right now. I failed my checkride. I will have to do it again.

I arrived at the airport extra-early, giving me time to update my weather briefing and finish up my "homework." Stephen showed up shortly thereafter, and we left for Santa Rosa early to do some last-minute patternwork at the Santa Rosa airport. Stephen arrived with bad news about the airplane, though. Since this is a public blog, I won't go into details, but basically, I was left with two choices: I could be 100% perfectly legal, but take a course of action which would add unnecessary difficulties to my checkride ... or I could skirt the law a little without risking my checkride performance. Given that the risk was very minimal and I wasn't doing anything immoral (like cheating on the checkride or such), I ultimately decided to take the former course.

We departed IFR even though the sky was clearing up. Oakland's radar is out of service today so they constantly ask you where you are to keep track of everyone.

Stephen showed me a few things I could expect when I pursue my IFR certification. As we climbed through the thinning cloud layer, he said, "Your 0.1 hours of IMC is about to begin." The airplane passed through the clouds in a matter of seconds. "Your 0.1 hours of IMC is now over." Quaint.

I arrived at Santa Rosa and entered traffic for 19, where Stephen had me do some touch-and-goes. I feel like my soft-field landings are fine, so I made all of them short-field. They got progressively better and better. When we were satisfied, I landed, refueled the plane at the same place I sprained my ankle, and brought it to the Sonoma Jet Center.

We had initially planned on getting a lunch, but with only 30 minutes until my checkride, Stephen suggested we just wait in the lounge. So I bought a snack and passed the time, waiting for Steve to show up.

He did around 1 pm. Steve is a talkative fellow who has a habit of going on long tangents, making it hard to follow his train of thought. He brought me into a room where he finished up my paperwork, then had me retire to his office to begin the oral exam.

The oral was straightforward and easy. I got a few questions wrong here and there, but on the whole, it was clear I had done my reading. Steve was satisfied. He then spent a short time talking about a person's inability to judge his own actions. He mentioned a pilot he flew with today, who, during the oral, had sworn up and down he was a careful and safe pilot, but when the checkride came, ignored warnings that could have compromised his safety. He used this as an example: You can say you're safe, and you're attentive, but your subconscious mind has an interesting way of conveniently missing key pieces of evidence when it doesn't want to believe. The trick to really being a safe pilot is to be able to step back and realize when you're purposely convincing yourself that everything is fine.

It sounded straightforward at the time, but as I now know, saying is easier than doing. If you read this blog entry to the end (foreshadow time!), you'll see how his advice couldn't have come at a more fortuitous time, for I myself will have fallen victim to this same trap before the end of the day.

He watched casually as I preflighted the plane. We entered the aircraft together and he gave me a bit of a pep talk, then had me depart the area. I was nervous, and it was obviously preventing me from thinking straight, but I told myself to focus and take things one step at a time. It seemed to help.

We departed runway 14, and as I was climbing, I realized I hadn't prepared myself for the fake cross-country flight at all. Steve noticed this. "So ... what navigation are we using for this flight?" he asked.

"Umm ... dead reckoning," I said, while I scrambled to find my flight plan in my kneeboard. I took it out, unfolded it, and read off the first heading: 120. I turned to 120 and continued climbing.

"Excellent. You're on course and you're climbing to altitude. That's all I need to see: It tells me you can do dead reckoning. Now show me VOR navigation."

OK, my mind switched gears rapidly. I tuned, identified, and twisted the Scagg's Island VOR. He told me to use Santa Rosa instead. This got me mixed up and I turned the wrong radial in, but eventually I noticed my mistake and corrected it. This is all he needed: If you make a mistake, it's fine, so long as you correct it. Saying that you know you did it wrong isn't good enough. You have to make it right. (You can guess why I'm being so emphatic here...)

So, at 3,500 feet, he had me do slow flight. No problem. Stalls? Fuggedabout it. Steep turns? Well, I made a mistake with the trim wheel, but in the end I managed to salvage it, and I think I was within parameters the whole time. Either Steve didn't notice or didn't care, because he said my airwork was great.

He then had me divert to Petaluma. I dialed it into the GPS. He said GPS navigation is like "fish in a barrel, but it's equipment in the plane, so you can use it. Would have been nice to see you find your way using a sectional, but still ... There's a GPS in the plane, you can use it. End of story."

Over Petaluma he told me he wanted to see that I could make a safe entry into the Petaluma pattern. Stephen had always told me to overfly the field at 500 feet above pattern altitude, but on my last checkride Liz said I really should be doing it 1,000 feet above, so I overflew the field about 1,000 feet above the pattern altitude. I noted the windsock, picked out some traffic, and then began my descending turn to enter a right 45 for runway 29.

Petaluma was particularly busy today, so much so that the radio was a constant stream of chatter. I turned the wrong direction to enter my 45, and I was rushing it, so I made it very close to the field. Steve was listening intently to the radio and looking all around the airplane. Had I been paying attention, I would have noticed: He was scared. He knew I was coming up on another plane (heard the other guy over the radio) and I didn't, and he was scrambling to find that guy before it was too late.

I made a shitty turn to enter the 45, and since it was in the wrong direction, I was too close to the field, completely in the wrong place, and since I wasn't listening to the radio, I had no idea that I was coming right into the path of another airplane.

"Maybe I should have made a left turn," I said. This was it. This was the last moment I could have saved my checkride. Had I fixed it, instead of saying it, I would have gotten another opportunity. But since I continued my right turn, Steve drew the line.

"Climb to 2,200 feet immediately and depart the area," he said. Either I didn't believe or didn't want to believe that this was the moment my checkride ended (or my subconscious mind was choosing to ignore the evidence), so I simply followed the instruction as if it were part of the test.

"Look behind you," he said. I did. Another Cessna was passing behind us, uncomfortably close. "You cut him off! I was listening to him over the radio, I knew he was coming right for us. I was hoping you heard him too. You gotta stay sharp around uncontrolled airports, they're very dangerous. And you were right. You should have turned left -- why didn't you? I don't mean to pick on you, I really don't ... this is a learning experience."

Steve has a way of going off on tangents that made it seem less bad than it was. When he launched into another story, I settled back, still believing the test was on. He had me return to Santa Rosa, where he said we would practice short and soft-field landings. I found it odd that we weren't going to go to Petaluma after all, but I just put it out of my mind rather than think about the implications.

Back at Santa Rosa I demonstrated my ability to work in controlled airspace, and got my landing clearance. Steve told me we'd be doing some short- and soft-field landings on 14. He asked me to make a short-field landing for my first one. I did so, and it went well, and the plane touched down without a hitch.

"Alright, take me back to the Jet Center."

It still hadn't gotten through my screen of denial, the implications of this statement. "I thought we were doing touch-and-goes?"

"You didn't pass the checkride. You know this." I guess on some level I did, but now every fiber of my body knew. He continued talking, leaving no pause, no opportunity for these words to hit me upside my head, and it worked somewhat. I brought the plane back to the Jet Center, already telling myself that it's done, there's no sense going on with the woulda-coulda-shouldas ... it's already over.

"You know," he continued, "it's somewhat luck too. If that plane hadn't been there, and you had made the mistakes, you'd have gotten your license. I would have said, 'Now, Tim, what you did back there was unsafe and I'd strongly recommend you brush up on your pattern entry skills,' but you would have gotten away with a warning. It's just bad luck there was a guy there. He scared me, and that's the end. Your examiner gets scared, checkride over."

We secured the plane and Steve went in to debrief Stephen. I collected my things (and myself), and made my best effort to not cower in front of Stephen's aura. I sat and listened to the debrief as professionally as I could, and tried not to look at Stephen's facial expression.

Once Steve had finished up, I apologized to Stephen for adding additional paperwork. "It's all part of the game," he said, though I detected some insincerity.

Stephen and I prepared to depart back to Oakland and call it a day. I was to schedule one more lesson to practice entry into uncontrolled airfields, then another checkride. As we walked out to the plane, I asked him: Why not do the practice now? I still have the plane for a few hours. He said sure.

I started the airplane's engine when an attendant for the jet center tried to get my attention. "He wants you to cut the engine," Stephen said. I turned the ignition switch to off. Stephen shook his head. "That's not how you shut down the engine," he said, pulling the mixture back to idle.

The engine stopped and the attendant began to reach beneath the plane to remove the chocks. As he did so, the engine sputtered back to life momentarily, and the propeller made a few more swipes through the air, then stopped. The attendant quickly withdrew his hand.

"What did you do?" Stephen screamed at me. "You nearly killed that guy!"

I immediately removed my hands from the controls. "I didn't touch anything!"

"Tim, calm down, take a breath, and do it by the checklist. Let's get out of here." His words stung, and I struggled to maintain composure while restarting the engine and departing the field.

"Are you sure you want to do this lesson?" Stephen asked, concern in his voice.

"I don't know. Let's go to Petaluma for starters and see how I do."

"Alright."

Stephen had me fly to Petaluma, where he talked me through an entry into the pattern. I overflew the field at 1,000 feet abovve, and Stephen said I really should do it at 500 feet above. I couldn't help but roll my eyes. Petaluma was still very busy, so it was difficult to squeeze my way into the pattern, but I managed to nonetheless. I made a poor landing, and the airplane bounced its way down the runway.

"So where to now?" I asked. "Gnoss?"

"I'd like to go back now," Stephen said. Since you don't argue with your instructor, I simply complied and took the plane back to Oakland. On the way back, as we passed over Berkeley, I began to think about what Steve had said, about complacency and ignoring evidence. It was at that time I noticed I was having trouble keeping my eyes open. This is about when it all fell together: I was exhausted, and it was impacting my performance. To you, the reader, this might have seemed obvious: I nearly killed someone starting the plane, I made a terrible landing at Petaluma, and I couldn't even keep my eyes open. But to me, I had no idea I was worn out until this very moment, because I was ignoring the evidence. I had a mental picture in my head, and having a picture in your head is so powerful that your subconscious will discard any evidence that works contrary to that picture.

Steve was right -- you can say this sort of stuff to a pilot... You can ask him on the oral what he would do in this situation and he would immediately say, "I would turn back and land. It's unsafe to be flying when you're that fatigued, and I put safety first." And you know what? He would believe it too. He would believe that, faced with that situation, he would make the right choice, and put safety first. Everyone does. It's not until you actually are faced with that situation, like I was just now, that you realize: Making that choice is harder than you'd think. It's an easy choice if you're given all the evidence, but your subconscious mind has a nasty way of withholding evidence you don't necessarily want to see.

While the thoughts pertinent to this epiphany were raging through my head, I said to Stephen, "You were right. I am worn out. I should have just headed back."

"I'm glad you realize that now."

We talked a bit about this sort of complacency, and Stephen's general opinion is that it's impossible to know yourself so well that you can make these kinds of decisions with total accuracy. The best you can do is try, and hindsight is always 20/20. I got my landing clearance at Oakland, made another shitty landing, fueled the plane, and returned to the Old T's.

Another day. For now ... I feel like people at work really miss me, taking all this time off. With so many aircraft down for repair, it's basically impossible to get a time slot that's not 3 weeks in the future, so my "finish-up" (as Steve calls it) might be a little while yet. A break would be nice, and some time to convince people at the office that I'm not completely off the map.

But I haven't given up yet.

Just an update.

I'm so scurred. The checkride is tomorrow. Examiner said I'm to plan my flight to Bakersfield.

Wish me luck!

Solo #5: Pre-checkride practice

I was supposed to fly on Friday, but it's been so cloudy lately that I was unable to go up. I remember in my phase check with Liz, I had commented that the clouds were getting worse, and that I felt rushed to finish up and get my license before the worst winter weather came. I was hoping she would diffuse the fear with a warm statement to the effect of, "Oh, it should get better for a while first." Her response ended up being, "Yeah ... things are getting bad quick." That didn't help.

I flew Saturday morning, with the intent of practicing what I had learned from Liz. It was still very foggy and cloudy when I woke up, but I held feeble hope that the weather would be good enough to solo by the time I had gotten to the airport. Things were indeed good enough to solo, but only marginally so, as I would soon see.

After I had lifted off into the air, climbing up a few hundred feet, it became immediately apparent that the poor weather would hinder my opportunities this flight. I had gotten my clearance to San Pablo Bay, but it was flanked by an imposing wall of clouds about 2,000 feet high. Had I a private pilot's license, I could simply fly above them, but alas, as a student pilot, I must stay below clouds at all times.

Indeed, the whole of the Bay was covered in clouds, with the exception of Oakland Airport. It was as if a single hole in the sky had been punched allowing me to take off, but leaving me with nowhere to go. Beneath the clouds it was hazy, and I could barely make out things more than 10 miles away.

The area behind Mt. Diablo looked more promising, so I asked NorCal if I could amend my clearance and go to Mt. Diablo instead. They approved my request but noted that numerous aircraft were also doing airwork there. Apparently others had had the same line of thought as I.

When I was over the practice area I began practicing my power-on and power-off stalls, as Liz had asked me to. NorCal chimed in now and then to keep me updated on a number of airplanes moving through the area. All in all, this made me feel very crowded, like I didn't have enough space to spread out and practice comfortably. I made frequent clearing turns and kept a wary eye out for all this traffic.

Practicing stalls alone feels unstructured, because you have no one to slap your wrists when you get lazy. I felt as if I hadn't broken the process down into discrete steps as the examiner would want, that I was just sort of mushing through it trying to get it all done. Liz would later suggest I try "armchair flying," where I simply sit in my chair at home and pretend I'm flying, thinking through and miming all the steps of a stall, one by one. It's sure a hell of a lot cheaper than flying, I'll give her that.

Eventually, as NorCal restricted me further and further, I got frustrated and decided to leave the area and head for Byron and practice an engine-failure-over-an-airfield the way Liz had asked me to. I punched Byron into 9UL's GPS and had it direct me to the field. NorCal saw I was leaving and let me go, and I changed frequencies. Judging by the amount of chatter on the Unicom, Byron wasn't exactly sleeping either.

I announced my intentions and positioned myself above the field at 3,000 feet. I cut the power and descended in circles over the 45-entry point. There was a glider circling the field as well, I saw him make long, slow circles near the smaller runway. I guess you could say there were two gliders that day. As I descended further, I saw a Pitts biplane working the pattern just below me. Realizing that, by forcing myself not to use power, I was creating a hazard for other aircraft, I decided to abort the descent. I pushed in power, climbed back to 3,000 feet, and moved a little further out.

The glider was now setting up to land on 23, while the Pitts was doing his touch-and-goes on 30. I cut power again and began descending turns over the reservoir. As I descended, I saw a pair of menacing black jets taxiing together parallel to 30. As they set up to take off, I heard their radio call.

"Experimental 59L, taking off, runway 30, pair of L-39's, formation departure, straight-out."

True to their word, the two black jets took the runway and blasted off in unison, accelerating quickly over the plains north of the airport. Oh, to own one of those... What sucks about flying in a 1969 Cessna 172 is that you're basically the bottom of the barrel. Every plane you see, whether it be a low-and-slow bush-flying STOL like the Scout, an aerobatic like the SF.260, or a high-speed thrill ride like these L-39's, is a plane you'd rather be in. It's such a long road to fly one of those jets, too ... you'd need a private pilot license with an airplane rating, high-performance endorsement, complex endorsement, a type-rating for an L-39, pressurized endorsement, and probably an instrument rating. You'd probably have to get well over 500 hours before even sitting in one of those things. Times like this make me feel like the road is so long.

As another aircraft joined the Pitts with his patternwork, I felt that even Byron was too busy for me to be doing simulated emergencies. Furthermore, it had dawned on me that I couldn't land at Byron as a student solo pilot anyway. That tears it ... I pushed the power back in and headed home. This wouldn't be the most productive practice session.

As I passed westward over the field, the glider was touching slowly down on 23. A small tow truck, barely a dot to me, was driving into position to haul it back to the tarmac. It was all interesting to watch. Gliders aren't really my thing -- I prefer the freedom of flying wherever I want to the challenge of staying aloft -- but I can see why they would be fun.

With the haze and the clouds threatening to ruin future flying opportunities, I've started viewing my instrument rating another way. What used to be an optional endeavor has now basically turned into a requirement, so much so that the glory of getting my pilot's license has been tempered. Upon receiving it, I'll still feel as if I'm only halfway done, that until I earn my instrument rating, I won't truly have my wings. After all, what good is a pilot when six months out of the year he can't fly because of clouds and rain?

Fortunately, the haze wasn't so bad that I couldn't find Oakland with the help of 9UL's trusty GPS. Tower told me to stay at or above 2,500 feet for some departing jet that I couldn't see. I ended up getting pretty close to the airport while staying up at 2,500 feet, long after I would have descended normally. In fact, by the time that jet passed me, I was not 3 miles from the field, way up high at 2,500 feet. Tower cleared me to land and told me to "descend at your discretion." Yeah.

I didn't really know what the "right" way to deal with this situation is, so I sort of made very steep S-turns on my base leg while dropping like a stone out of the sky, bleeding off all this useless altitude. My last S-turn put me right on target and set me up for a perfect final, so even though I wasn't really intending it to look good, it ended up looking basically perfect, like I knew exactly what to do. I brought the plane down for a gentle landing.

At Kaiser they had coned off one of the fuel pumps, leaving only one other. N612SP, Stephen's personal aircraft, was sucking up gas at the available pump, although Stephen wasn't at the controls. It was the other guy he rents the plane to. Not wanting to waste gas and engine time, I shut off my plane and hauled out the towbar, preparing to haul the plane to the pump myself.

When 2SP was filled up, her pilot procured her towbar (which looks a hell of a lot nicer than mine) and began hauling 2SP out of the way by hand. All the while a very fancy-looking business jet had taxied right next to Kaiser to pick up some very rich fellows. They had stepped out of the Kaiser terminal, a husband and wife, dressed in brand-name suits and carrying brand-name luggage. They watched me and the other pilot with a sort of wonder, as we both struggled to pull our planes along together, each laborious step inching a 4,000-pound aircraft a little closer. All this while an attendant collected their fancy bags and loaded them into their fancy jet's luggage compartment. I'm never one to be bitter about those who have more money than me (after all, it's capitalism at work), but the whole picture was noteworthy, to say the least.

After getting the plane positioned, I filled her up and then went into Kaiser to pick up an A/FD. I'll need it for the checkride. I ended up buying the wrong one (Northwest refers to Oregon and above; California is in Southwest), so now I have two. Well, I suppose it will be useful if sometime I fly way (way) off-course and end up in Idaho...

On my way in I had noticed an F/A-18 Hornet, a beautiful Naval fighter jet, parked at the jet center. (Is today "Everyone show off the paramilitary jets you own" day?) I vowed to take a photo of it for me and you guys. However, a tiny gnat of an aircraft, a low-wing half the size of my plane, had taxiied behind me and was waiting for gas. Weighing my options, I ultimately decided to push my airplane backwards to where the closed fuel pump was, out of the way of other planes, then rush and snap that photo:



The pilot and his buddy of the gnat were pulling it into position. With gas prices so high, everyone uses towbars nowadays. I hopped into my airplane to start her up. As I did, the pilot of the gnat approached me. I was worried he was going to lecture me about where I had pushed my plane; I was new to this situation so I just had to guess where to put my plane. In fact, he asked me, "d'ya want me to remove your towbar before you taxi?"

Huh. "Yes please." That would have been bad.

He removed the towbar from the nosewheel and handed it to me. I thanked him, shut the door, and started the plane. I brought her to the Old T's, shut her down, and headed back to the clubhouse where Liz was instructing one of her students on slips-to-land. She and I had a good talk on my performance, and she was pleased that I was taking what she had said to heart. She wished me luck on my checkride (along with her quiet, shy poindexter of a student) as I left the airport.

Cost so far: $9,678.47
Time so far: 169 days
Hours so far: 57.5
Flights so far: 38

Phase check #2

The second phase check is the final club-mandated step before I can do my checkride. It's an opportunity for an instructor who isn't Stephen to evaluate me and make sure I'm ready. Though I've got two more solos scheduled for touchups, at this point I am now home free to take my checkride.

I got to the Old T's late but Liz was still patiently waiting for me. She chatted with me a bit during preflight, informing me that she has a habit of writing things down throughout the examination -- it can appear ominous, but she writes good things down as well as bad.

The winds today were unusually strong -- 18 gusting to 26 at Oakland. Despite this I never used any sort of crosswind takeoff procedure; it had simply slipped my mind. Liz would ding me for this later. A fire in the San Jose hills blanketed the South Bay with smoke, visible even from Oakland. The wind was coming from a very unusual direction, 160 degrees, so I got clearance to runway 15.

We took off for the Mt. Diablo practice area where Liz had me do some simple hood work holding headings an altitudes. My ability to maintain an altitude has clearly gotten rusty, but it was within standards so she didn't note anything. She had me do some steep turns and other basic maneuvers over Livermore and south of Mt. Diablo. We climbed well past 6,000 feet, the highest I'd ever been in a club aircraft.

Liz had the most issue with my stalls. Stephen had apparently never taught me to keep my hands off the aileron, and it was my habitual use of ailerons for correction that was causing my stalls to be so ugly. It took several stalls to work it out of me, but by the end I had nearly kicked the habit, and I was using strictly rudder coming into and out of the stall.

Periodically Liz would tip her attention down to scribble a note on her kneeboard. I know she had said earlier that she writes both good and bad notes, but you can't shake a subtle feeling of failure each time she does it, like you're being "written up" for some infraction you made.

Next came the unexpected (but unavoidable) simulated engine failure. I had remembered what Stephen told me about making my turns as if I were flying the pattern. I picked a landing spot right alongside I-5 and began pattern turns as I lost altitude. Liz, however, did not like this approach. She later insisted that I should position the airplane at the 45-degree entry point and make tight circles there, so that when I reached pattern altitude I simply had to fly the base and final legs. This is completely different than what Stephen suggested, and I felt like I was being pulled two ways. Now, frankly, if I really do have an engine failure at high altitude, I'll have no idea which of the two strategies to use.

With all our altitude now gone, Liz had me set up for ground-reference maneuvers. First was S-turns along a country road out east of Mt. Diablo, then turns around a point. The point in this case was a large gray barn. With the wind so strong, my corrections were very obvious, and it was clear to Liz I knew how to perform the maneuver. Flying so low to the ground on a hot day meant the plane was constantly buffeted by strong turbulence. My stomach can usually handle turbulence just fine but this was trying even for me.

Next we headed to nearby Byron Airport for patternwork and landings. This was a very unusual experience: The wind was over 20 knots fast, and shooting nearly straight down the runway. The result of this is that the plane came into land at basically a crawl -- I felt like I could hover the plane at a standstill above the runway, the wind was so strong. Another airplane without a radio was in the pattern with me: Watching him land was like watching a helicopter land, inching excruciatingly slowly to the touchdown point.

Liz had me do some soft-field landings (short-field landings weren't really necessary with the wind; I was able to stop the plane in only a few hundred feet anyway). She critiqued my pattern as having gotten sloppy. Although the unrelenting wind and turbulence was partially to blame, it's true I've started cutting corners on my base and final legs.

Following that we returned to Oakland. I had to climb up above the mountains south of Diablo to get a signal. Cresting over the peaks, I was greeted by an East Bay shrouded in low-level clouds. I was worried, but Liz had me listen to the ATIS one more time, which remarked "few clouds" over the airport. Liz assured me that this meant that while most of the Bay was covered in this marine layer, the airport, at least, was clear enough to land at.

So, I weaved between the clouds on my way to Oakland, picked out the 27R runway, and landed. Liz remarked my crosswind landings were perfect. Lots of practice, I guess. I taxied to Kaiser and refueled alongside a Decathlon painted in stunning shades of blue and green:



I wouldn't immediately call the livery beautiful, but it was certainly a refreshing change from the usual yellow-and-black scheme. Parked nearby was N612SP, Stephen's personal aircraft, and he had his head inside the cockpit. We walked over to chat with him a bit. After I left to fuel the plane, Liz had a private chat with Stephen, no doubt about my strengths and weaknesses.

I took Liz and I back to the clubhouse where she went over her thoughts, point-by-point. It was a lot to take in, so I asked her for four or five things I should concentrate on for my next two solos, to improve my checkride performance. She gave me her top picks, and I wrote them down. I have two solos to iron out these bugs, then it's checkride time.

Cross-country solo #4: Backwater fun

When my checkride does come, what's likely to happen is this: Steve (the checkride examiner) will tell me to plan a flight to some far-off distant land. We'll take off and I'll begin flying there; however, rather than sit on his ass for a few hours while we trundle along, he'll divert me to a nearby airport where I can show him I know how to do landings and patternwork. The airports he generally likes to take people to are Gnoss (DVO), Petaluma (O69), Healdsburg (O31), and Cloverdale (O60). I've been to the first two, but never to Healdsburg or Cloverdale, so Stephen thought it useful that I do a cross-country solo to those two airports.

One of the things I enjoy doing before a cross-country solo is firing up Microsoft Flight Simulator and "e-flying" the route to get a feel for it. Flight simulator helps you learn where small airports are in relation to major land features. I was able to figure out where to look for Healdsburg Airport when I was over Santa Rosa, it being nestled in the foothills of the Santa Rosa Valley. One thing it does not portray very accurately is the quaint beauty of the surroundings.

I departed Oakland under the watchful guise of NorCal, who kept clearing me into class-B airspace even though I repeatedly told them I was a student pilot and therefore unable to enter the class-B airspace. Using 9UL's GPS I flew a course over Scagg's Island to Santa Rosa, passing over the airport at 4,500 feet. Stephen had said I could just fly direct to Healdsburg, and I was initially intending to, but I decided it would be very unlikely that Steve The Checkride Examiner would have me fly direct, so I got the "full experience" by navigating from waypoint to waypoint.

Over Santa Rosa and 8 miles out, Oakland Center asked me if I had Healdsburg in sight yet. I said, somewhat embarassingly, that I did not. I poured over the sectional chart, comparing features on the ground and in the map, and struggled to envision the surround in Flight Simulator. Finally, a few minutes later, I picked out its tiny runway in the distance, and gleefully informed Center of my accomplishment.

Descending into Healdsburg I was greeted with the typical CTAF audio experience: A jumble of pilots talking over each other and getting stepped on. As I descended further into the valley, flanked by mountain ranges that rose above me, most of the excess noise was filtered out until about the only thing I could hear on the advisory frequency was Healdsburg and Cloverdale traffic.

Preparing to land, I immediately discovered that Healdsburg has a gorgeous final approach -- probably the most interesting I've seen. You skim the tops of rolling hills, fields of grass and wheat, cows and horses, trees, and ponds and streams. It was as if I had flown into a Calvin & Hobbes strip where they explore the backwoods on one of their treks. It was so mesmerizing that I vowed to fly it again, so that I could snap a picture:



OK, so the picture doesn't really do it justice. Healdsburg is a sleepy airport (surprise) with a rather confusing taxiway layout. I managed to get my airplane back on runway 31 for takeoff, where I did a practice go-around and then proceeded further north to Cloverdale. I snapped a picture of the field as I departed northward.



Cloverdale was just a hop, skip, and a jump away, so I merely had to climb to a thousand feet or so to clear a line of hills between to the two airports. The view along the way was more of the same gorgeous backwater northern California fields.



As I crossed over the hills, Cloverdale came into view in the distance. I was already just about lined up to its runway 32, so I figured that rather than fly the pattern, I'd just make a long straight-in approach. I wondered briefly if that sort of thing is safe at untowered airports (or if you are expected to enter the pattern normally no matter what), but I figured as long as I announced my position diligently and kept an eye out it shouldn't be a problem. It would only occur to me later that perhaps I should have practiced the pattern at Cloverdale, since there's not much point in just landing there and taking off.

The landing at Cloverdale was pretty uneventful save for a very unnerving gust of wind that hit me as I was only a few feet above the field. It lifted the plane up and almost outside the runway border. I seriously contemplated going around for a second or so, but ultimately decided the landing was salveagable. I didn't land on the centerline by any stretch of the imagination, but I got the plane down OK, and that's what matters.

I taxiied to the fuel pump, which was in plain view. I had to pee pretty badly, and was relieved to find a restroom right nearby, covered in spiders and spiderwebs. After emptying my tanks and filling my plane's, I started her back up and brought her back to runway 32 for takeoff. Next to me were a group of people walking to the airport in skydiving gear. I wondered who would come all the way out to this nowhere airport to go skydiving. Perhaps for the scenery?

As I departed Cloverdale for Oakland, I snapped a picture of the field, which in retrospect looks a lot like Healdsburg:



I checked in with Oakland Center and got my flight following back to the airport. It was a nice cruise back to the Bay Area, so I took the time to stare wistfully out the window and watch the scenery crawl by beneath me. I took a few scenic detours here and there, as I was in no rush, enjoying the North Bay. Things got busier when I checked in with NorCal and got my approach clearance. Lately I've been making my approach course directly over my own apartment. This allows me to gawk at my neighborhood from above (who doesn't love that), and the noise from flying low and slow over the area helps keep the rent down.

I landed at Oakland, and as is the case after every cross-country flight, my feet struggled to know ground for a few minutes, and my inner ear felt like it was banking and soaring for most of the day. It's all part of what makes it so exciting.

Cost so far: $8,925.82
Time so far: 162 days
Hours so far: 54.1
Flights so far: 36