Private Pilot

Finally!  I took my checkride today, and passed without any drama.  I flew down to Long Beach to do my ride with the DPE down there.  He was the easiest to schedule with of the examiners I talked with, which was good since I ended up needing to reschedule 3 times due to mechanical issues.

The oral portion went fine, he asked me the standard stuff about airspace minimums, documentation, medicals, currency, aeromedical factors, etc.  I was surprised that he did not really go into weather at all.  He also used the session as an opportunity to elaborate on some topics, teach me some stuff, and see if I knew details that he did not expect me to know.  He also threw in some casual conversation in between questions, I think to keep things relaxed.  Overall, I'd say relaxed was the word of the day.  

Then we went out and flew around a bit.  I had been to LGB only once before, and was still a little unfamiliar with the procedures, especially their departure clearance, and he was very willing to led a hand with that stuff.  We did 3 touch-and-go's to demonstrate different landings, and then left the pattern for the first leg of the cross country.  We did not even get out of the pattern before he diverted me to overfly Compton airport.  Then we headed out over the harbor for some steep turns and stalls.  I recovered from the power off stall a little before the stall really happened, and he was cool with that, but he did do it again to make sure I was cool with it.  I flew back to LGB under the hood, making various descending turns to headings, landed with no flaps, and that was it.  Throughout the whole thing he was good about mentioning "you're doing well" which was nice.  He was also good about giving me quick little hints and reminders to check things before they got out of hand. 

I'm really glad to have my license now, so that Jen can come up with me, and so that we can start going places!

Cross Country Flying

I went flying yesterday and today, and knocked out my "solo cross-country" experience requirements.  Yesterday I flew up to Apple Valley and back, over the mountains.  Today I flew out to Palm Springs, then stopped at Brackett on my way back to satisfy the 3 landing point requirement of the "long" cross country (cross country is the flying term for flights to a different airport than from where you started.  They don't need to be across the entire country.)

The weather yesterday was perfect for flying: 70 degrees, almost unlimited ceiling and visibility, light-to-no wind, no turbulence.  Today, on the other hand, was not ideal.  The weather briefing indicated "not recommended for VFR flight" due to low ceilings.  I thought I wouldn't be able to go, but my route did not require any altitude that would exceed the forecast ceiling.  

Palm Springs is about 78 nautical miles away, just far enough that the round trip flight would satisfy the 150 n.m. requirement.  But, I needed to fill a lot of time.  Yesterday's flight was 2 hours, and I needed to stretch this one a bit to make it more than 3 hours so I could get o

ver 5 hours of cross country without making another flight.  To do this, I flew really slow.  2000-2200 rpm gave excellent fuel economy, but was definitely not fast.  I burned about half a tank in the 3 hours of flight, less than 4 gallons per hour.

On the way back, just about at El Monte, I saw some traffic near me (there was a lot of other 

traffic throughout the flight, but not like this.)  I was descending for a couple minutes of  

ground reference maneuvers to burn time, and saw what the traffic was up close: a B-2 stealth bomber.  That is a cool looking airplane.

Compared to my little Cessna 152, which looks like this, I felt a little bit of airplane envy.  I was going to ask him if he wanted to race, but figured he'd beat me anyway.  He made several passes over pasadena, each time turning around over the santa fe dam practice area.  I hung around there for a while so I could see him again, trying to keep out of the way so he wouldn't decide to shoot me out of the air.

Now that I finished the cross country requirements, I am at about 38 hours total time.  I need to do a bit more work on steep turns and stalls before I will be ready for my check ride, but all the major requirements are taken care of, and I should be on track for getting my rating with low-40's hours.  Sweet!

Solo Flight!

I did my first solo yesterday afternoon!  We went up for just a few minutes for a couple ground reference maneuvers, and a couple landings to be sure I wasn't rusty from a week out of the cockpit, then Russ got out and I went back up.  

I did 4 landings to a full stop without any problems.  I was pretty surprised how much faster the plane climbed and took off with only one person, it nearly jumped off the ground!  Russ said to expect better performance, but I didn't think it would be that much better.  

After landing, I lost the back of my shirt for the first solo tradition.  

"In aviation lore, the traditional removal of a new pilot's shirt tail is a sign of the instructor's new confidence in his student.  In the days of tandem trainers, the instructor would tug at the student's shirt tail whenever he was getting himself into trouble.  After the first solo, the new pilot is competent in the air and does not need such a safety device."

(wikipedia)

I'm on my way now to getting my private.  I will continue with my solos, and do a solo cross country soon.  I waited to solo until I did almost all of the dual instruction time, so I will now spend the rest of my time preparing for my checkride.  I'm at about 28 hours so far.  The required ten solo hours will put me under 40, then a few more hours of dual checkride prep.  Depending on when I feel ready, I could get my license in just a little over the required 40 hours total time!

Yosemite Trip

This last weekend Jen and I went up to Yosemite Valley to meet up with Matt Upton, who is in San Francisco going to law school.  We did some climbing, and some walking around, and some checking stuff out, and a lot of relaxing.  I had Friday off of work, so we left after work on Thursday, and got up to the valley around 11 pm.  It was really nice to get there Thursday night, because that left us with two full days with no traveling.  It was a mini vacation.  The weather was absolutely perfect, 40's at night, 70's in the day.  

We stayed in Curry Village because all the campgrounds were full, and I didn't want to hassle with camp 4, setting up a tent a midnight and all, if we could even get in.  Curry Village is a bit expensive for what it is, but it was a fun throwback to an older time (turn of the last century) when American's didn't all own RV's and actually liked to do things like hiking.  

We didn't do a huge amount of climbing, a little bit each day, but it was fantastic.  Of course, if you don't like climbing in Yosemite, you probably don't like climbing.  We did some easy stuff,  and some harder stuff with the help of Matt's friend Tim's leading skills.  The climbing really reinvigorated my enthusiasm about climbing.  I'd been a little down on climbing lately because of what I see as crappy (and mostly sport) climbing in the immediate LA area.  I'm just spoiled because it's not Boulder.  But now I'm psyched to cruise down to Joshua Tree for some more great cracks now that the weather is cooling off down there.  

We also saw some wildlife up there.  On the walk up to one of the climbs, I wasn't watching where I was going and almost tripped over a big buck that was laying down at the base of the cliff.  Ten minutes later while we were hanging out, a bear cruised past!  Neither of them gave us any trouble, but it was pretty exciting!

Overall, the trip was a great little mini-vacation from the LA area.  It felt like we were gone for a long time, and it was really relaxing.  I posted some pictures on Picasa, follow the link on the right to see them.

flying

I went flying last Saturday with the intention of seeing if I want to get my pilot’s license. I definitely do, flying was great! The instructor took off, and once we were about 1,000 feet off the ground, he handed over the controls to me. I climbed to about 3,500 feet, leveled off, and flew around for a while. We were up for an hour total, and by the end I was actually starting to feel a little comfortable with the whole operation. I got a feel for how to work the elevator trim tab, and was able to fly with just a few fingers. Turbulence still unnerved me a bit. At first I was too concerned with flying the plane to check out the scenery, but after a while I was able to enjoy the great view of the San Gabriel Mountains to the north of Pasadena. My guess is that they tell everyone this on their first flight, but the instructor said he didn’t believe that it was my first time flying. I am going to start taking regular lessons as soon as I can sort out joining the JPL/Caltech flying club where I can get cheaper rates their planes than at a place trying to make a profit.

City of Angels, one week in

I've been in LA for one week now, and am kind of starting to get a feel for JPL and how things work. I have a short term project to work on which will give me some autonomy and not be too stressful. That will be nice, allowing me to ease into the work environment and learn how things get done before I really have to worry about actually getting them done. It seems like all my coworkers are pretty good people, and smart too. I think it will be a good place.

It also appears that LA might not be so bad. I went for a really nice hike today, just minutes from town, and there was hardly anyone out. I guess there are a ton of nice hikes right in the San Gabriel mountains, which are at the edge of town in the same way that Mt. Sanitas rises out of the edge of town in Boulder. Then there's the Santa Monica Mountains on the other side of town, which sound like the same thing, and also the Angeles Crest Mountains behind the San Gabriels, which may require a bit more driving, but are supposed to be very nice. It sounds like at least a few of the people I work with like to ride bikes, or are otherwise active.

I signed up at the climbing gym near my temp housing, and it's been good to get some climbing strength back, but I'm not in love with the gym. Most gyms mark the routes with colored tape, but these guys just choose holds all of the same color. Then when they want to put up another route but are out of different colors to use in the same area, they'll begrudgingly resort to the standard colored tape method. Maybe 25% or less of the routes are taped. That leaves me totally screwed because I'm mostly colorblind. Colored tape is hard enough some times, but holds covered in chalk and grime are basically impossible for me to determine. Oh well, just have to ask for help in "finding the route" despite people's crazy looks. "You're asking me to show you the blue ones?!?"

I get a sweet Independence Day vacation. I work Mon & Tues and am off the rest of the week. I'm trying to figure out how to get out of town for that. I'm thinking of going kayaking or camping on one of the channel islands, or maybe just backpacking somewhere inland. I'm sure I can come up with something good.

That's all for now, gonna make some mac n' cheese and figure out what movie to see.

Getting ready to move to LA

Jen and I were out in LA looking for a place recently, and we found a pretty cool space. The lease starts August 1, which is perfect, since the tenants at out place in CO will start their lease on the same day. I plan to take advantage of the temporary housing provided by JPL until then. Here is a link to some pictures of our new place:
1010sycamore110.com

Back here in Colorado, we've been busy getting ready to move. We had a big yard sale this weekend and made about $1,000! The trouble with making a grand at a yard sale is that you inevitably realize that you made pennies on the dollar, and probably just got rid of $10,000 worth of stuff. It's still good though, because it's all stuff we were not using, and it simplifies life not to have unnecessary crap.

I've also been busy getting the house ready to rent out. There were a number of half finished projects that I've been banging out, as well as just general things that needed to be done.

I leave for LA on Sunday, and start work a week from today. I'm excited to see what I'll be working on. I've confirmed that I have all my paperwork filed correctly, but still have this feeling that I'm going to show up and they are going to wonder who the hell I am. I'm sure it will work out fine... it better.