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!