Enjoying the Last of the Warm Weather

Lesson 30
11-21-12
1.0 hours logged
36.1 hours total recorded in logbook

As has happened quite a few times now, I came not from home to flying lesson at HXF but from Milwaukee. I had just performed a concert at St. John's Cathedral and wondered if I might be too tired for flying. I guess I shouldn't have. What better way to celebrate than by going up for a flight? It was 3:30 by the time I arrived at the airport and the sun was lowering in the sky, lending beauty through its golden rays to an otherwise dull landscape. But its descent also signalled only a limited time left for flight (since the Cubs are not equipped with position lights they can only be flown from sunrise to sunset) so I wasted no time in preflighting the Cub. Everything was fine so Joe and I climbed in and taxied to 18 for takeoff. I'd been hoping to get some solo time but gusty winds and quite a bit of traffic in the pattern and around the airport precluded this.

We stayed in the pattern and managed to fit the usual eight landings in an hour. They weren't all "usual landings" though. That's not to say they were bad. Most of them were quite good in fact, but just so things didn't get too easy for me, Joe pulled the power on me a couple times and we practiced engine out landings, specifically noting the effect of wind and how it can help or hinder a dead stick landing.

Then we switched to using runway 11 to practice some deliberate crosswind landings. I can always use more practice on these. The thought of doing them at all is still a little intimidating, I find, but the only way to overcome your fears is to face them so that is what I did and all went just fine.

Meanwhile the sun sank lower and lower and its disappearance behind a low bank of clouds resting on the horizon as we flew the pattern told us that this would have to be our final landing of the day. As we touched down, I noticed that the lights bordering the runway had come on. These give a particular beauty to an airport at night, I've often thought. We taxied to a stop in front of the hangar and pushed the Cub back inside in the last of the quickly fading daylight. Joe shut the hangar door. The Cubs were all tucked in for the night and I, too, was ready to get home.

It was a wonderfully warm day for flying--probably the last of the warm weather we'll get until spring, I was thinking. It had been a year ago that very day that I'd had my very first lesson at CubAir, and I remember how cold it was then, so I made it a point to enjoy this last of the warm temperatures. Soon we'll be saying goodbye to the personal comfort of a warm cockpit for a while.

The sun sets over HXF

My first lesson at CubAir a year ago already? Wow! More than the cold, I just remember my excitement, the thrill that only low and slow flight in a Cub can give. It was wonderful! Thus began that part of my aviation journey which has become the long road toward obtaining my pilot's license. I honestly didn't expect it to take this long. There was, of course, a long period of several months between my first couple lessons and when I picked up again in the spring and another month and a half of no flying in summer and all that bad weather last month preventing me from doing much flying. I suppose if it hadn't been for these interruptions, I'd be much farther along and likely would even be done. As it is now, my hopes of being done by Christmas  have faded. It's disappointing but beyond my control. It would be easy to become discouraged but I just have to remind myself that this is a journey and I must enjoy the ride no matter how slow it sometimes seems.