Onandowaga Ska:t Ji:yäh

Translation from Seneca language: Seneca One Dog

I knew going in to this that Seneca's are not training aircraft. They just aren't as hearty as a Seminole. Two flights in a row had to be cancelled. One for a bad o-ring in the left landing gear, which caused the complete loss of oleo pressure. The second cancellation was due to screws missing from the landing light cover assembly. I think the common thread with Seneca troubles is LANDING GEAR. At this rate, it will take until January to complete all of the lessons for commercial multi engine.


/RANT OFF

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Last week, after the unpleasant experience in the beater 182 I was looking forward to taking my father and aunt on a flight to Payson. Last time my father was in Payson, a friend took him to Crosswinds Restaurant at Payson Airport (KPAN). He had been talking about the biscuits and gravy there ever since.



The only issue with taking my father and my aunt to Payson, elevation 5,150 feet, is weight. Now I beat anorexia hands down a few years back and have no trouble making the scale tip north of 225. My father is 6'3" and enjoys fine dining on occasion. My aunt is 5'11". Three of us and full tanks = overweight for a 172. Angel Air has a brand new 182 G1000 but, at $180 an hour, is destined to be their newest hangar queen. I figure the owner will go down to $160 within a month, but I digress. Fuel to tabs on a 172 would put us within weight and balance. Weather was forecast to be nice and cool, so density altitude wouldn't be an issue.



My aunt was so excited that she arrived an hour early. We made our way to Stellar and stuffed ourselves into N20984, a nice 2004 G1000 equipped 172.



The flight up was nice, albeit slow. We flew the West VFR Transition over Sky Harbor and then direct to Payson. The climb rate wasn't too hot. It took quite a while to reach 9,500'. I picked up AWOS for Payson and then tuned in the CTAF for a heads up. The winds were favoring runway 6 and I heard people using both 6 & 24. Hmm. The people that were landing on Rwy. 6 were calling right traffic. Hmm. The AFD says right for 24, but not 6. About 15 miles out, I inquired "Isn't runway 6 left traffic?" Apparently, somebody was frustrated by it more than I was. I got a very enthusiastic "YES IT IS THANK YOU!" About 30 seconds later, someone else came on and said they were changing to left traffic. I'm glad that was out of the way before I hit the pattern. We landed smoothly and found a great tie down next to a Cardinal and a twin Cessna (402B, I think).

We made our way to Crosswinds for a great breakfast. The view is incredible. Not only is there the requisite runway view, but also the Mogollon Rim to enjoy. While we killed a few thousand calories, some very nice planes came in. There was a beautifully restored T-6 Texan, a Trinidad GT and my first sighting of a Diamond DA-42 Twin Star. Can an aircraft be hideous and beautiful at the same time? I think so. If I had a spare $400K, it would go for a Diamond DA-42. (In my best Raymond Babbit voice) Yeah definitely the Diamond. Definitely the Diamond.


The trip back was smooth. Everybody played nice on the comms and a nice tailwind took us back with a 136 knot ground speed. My father wanted to see where I was going to school, so we made a quick stop at Williams Gateway. When we departed, there were several T-38's leaving and we all enjoyed seeing that. The trip from Gateway to Stellar takes all of 5 minutes and we were back on the ground. Overall, it was a very nice trip. My father, who spent hundreds of hours in Cessnas doing traffic reports in San Francisco, complimented me on my flying and that he thinks I'm a safe pilot. It is nice to hear that from your father. My aunt said it was the best time she's had all year. I'm glad they both had such a good time. I did too.



Saturday was also my youngest son's 4th birthday. As soon as I got home, my son asked if I was taking him flying in an "aiwpowt for his birfday". How could I say no? I called around and found an airplane available at Falcon Field. After a brief stop at Arby's for some brain food, we were all at Falcon and ready to go.

My youngest heading for 1st airplane ride

Excited boys!

Are we there yet?

We loaded up and flew Northeast towards Saguaro and Canyon Lakes, then South over The Superstition Mountains. My wife and daughter think touch and go's are fun, so we did a few at Gateway and then headed back to Falcon. Other than my middle son getting a little freaked out when I banked over Canyon Lake, everyone had a really good time. Now that my youngest has actually flown in a small plane, he will understand the difference between and airplane and an airport. He confuses the two. Hopefully I'll be able to afford a larger plane one of these days. Pretty soon, they'll be too small to squeeze into a Cherokee.