Monday, May 27, 2019

Flying - Memorial Day Flight To Saginaw

I had panned to fly with Leah to Jackson today, but Leah wanted to see some water on this flight. So off to Saginaw Bay we went. The weather promised nice solid VFR and high clouds that wouldn't be in the way and only moderate winds.

A solid preflight, a good start and we were off from Runway 9L, heading north.

Soon we were 20 miles away form Saginaw's TRSA so we gave them a call, stated out intentions to tour the bay and then land at Saginaw and we got a transponder code and then could fly around the area with no problems.

We flew over Bay City airport on the way:

We soon reached Bay City itself.

Yes, that's the USS Edson below.

A fitting flyover for Memorial Day.

Then up the river to Saginaw Bay itself. You can see from above very clearly where the swollen and muddy river empties out into the blue of the bay:

Then we flew out into the Bay, and over the rather large and impressive Shelter and Channel Island.

After that we headed to Saginaw, landing on Runway 14 after being directed into a left base entry, with a bit of crosswind as the very large Runway 5/23 is out of service for maintenance until August, but the 6,000 feet of Runway 14 more than sufficed.

Then we took off and headed back to Pontiac.

On the way back I was flying so smoothly my passenger actually fell asleep for awhile.

Getting flight following all the way through Flint's Class C airspace. I was instructed to maintain 4,500 feet throughout their airspace and that's what I did. Radar services were terminated once I was 12 miles from Pontiac so I contacted them, was told to ident and setup for and report a left base entry for 9L.

Then to Pontiac, landing on 9L with a 13 knot crosswind, but no issues and it was a very sweet landing, with compliments from my passenger.

After that we taxi'd back to the hangar, refueled the plane for the next pilot who was coming at 2 for a flight and then we had a picnic lunch at the airport, watching planes land and takeoff.

These planes included N73455, the first plane I ever flew solo:

And N8428S, The plane I now fly solo and own a share in:

That's 1.8, 2 landings, and some more great memories in the books.

4 comments:

B said...

Nice!

Me and MC did 1.o and 2 this morning, a quick tour along the southern shore of Lake Michigan, but the clouds were at 3000 and lowering fast so we cut it short and went back home.

The beaches were nearly deserted at 10 AM.

Twas a nice fun relaxing flight.

Still working for the IFR cert.

B said...

PS, we should do a fly in meet to KLAN or somewhere close to Eaton Rapids and do lunch some Saturday or Sunday and meet "ERJ".

Aaron said...

B: Thanks, it was a very nice flight.

Last time I met up with ERJ and Scott it was at KFPK in Charlotte, a nice little airport close to Eaton Rapids.

Old NFO said...

Nicely done!