First Cross Country...

Well, since my last post, I have flown twice and the last flight was fairly uneventful so thus the lack of a post. That flight was a little work with my instructor at a controlled field followed up with 3 full stop landings to complete my requirements for solo work at a controlled field. There really was nothing to write home about except my first solo landing was horrible!!! I am pretty sure I readjusted the field elevation! The last two were much better and the airplane was still in one piece when I was done.

So today, I did my first cross country. I did most of the planning last night and I guess I did OK as my instructor had no critiques about it (and he critiques EVERYTHING!!!). So, we head out to the plane and off we go. I really thought I would get behind the airplane since the first part is assholes and elbows, but it went fairly smooth. All my calculations were pretty darn right on, although we couldn't get to the planned cruising altitude because of clouds. So, anyway...we get up to Fredericksburg and I grease the landing...hot damn!!! That made my day especially the number of "spectators" there were once we got to the ramp. I would have LOVED to see those 20+ people's expression if had "pranged" it on!!! So, we had a nice lunch, checked out the sites on the airport (quite a few REALLY nice airplanes!!!), talked about how much an idiot Obama is and then jumped in to head back. The first leg was a mix of dead reckoning, pilotage (looking out the window) and VOR work. The second leg was nothing but looking out the window. Everything was great until my instructor kep having me change my course about 10-15 degrees from my plan. I'm not sure why he was doing this, but before too long, the field was off by about...can you guess? Yeah, about 15 degrees!!! He never explained what the rationale was, but I guess it's kinda my fault too for not asking "what are we doing again?" Anyway, we got back to the airport and that landing was not that pretty...I think a good gust got me, but hey, that's OK. I am kinda curious about one thing...my CFI keeps telling me I am not lined up, so when I "line up", the nose is always off by about 5 degrees from the runway. If I feel like I am lined up, he says I am crabbed but when he says I am lined up, I feel like we are crabbed the other way. I'm not sure what the issue is there...one of our sets of eyes ain't workin' quite right I believe!

So, all in all the cross country went well. I didn't get behind the airplane and besides fighting the power (kept creeping up and down) I think it went real well. The plan for next week is as follows: Tuesday, a little solo work in the pattern. Thursday; night pattern work. Saturday; solo cross country. So it seems to REALLY be moving along quite well. Since the end does appear to be in sight, it is time to really start studying for the written exam. My CFI told me when I score over 90 on 3 practice tests, he will sign me off to test. So, hopefully I'll get that done in the next week or so too.