After a lousy night's sleep, when Steve got up early, I wasn't too far behind him. I kissed Kaylee goodbye while she slept, and made it to Kokomo by 7:50 a.m. Steve and AE drove over with the trailer and stuff, and Justin and I flew over in the T-6. There were airplanes all over the place. It was like an Oshkosh. Only uncontrolled. :) Everywhere. I fit into the pattern, did a "good morning, we are here" low pass, entered downwind again, and this is where it went downhill. Did I mention the traffic was everywhere? I ended up behind this experimental guy who was on a huuuuge left downwind, like 3 miles away. Then he did a huuuuuge base leg. I mean, you'd think this guy was flying a 757. I'm doing slow flight behind him because he's also a slow experimental. We are a big conga line of airplane way out there, and somebody gets on the radio and says "If this traffic pattern gets any bigger, we're going to be in Indy". No joke. I give Mr. Experimental what should be plenty of room, but he taxiis as badly as he flies, and once he landed he just mosied on down the runway, passed up the intersections, kept taxiing, until I was over the runway, keeping power in to not touch down, waiting...he didn't get off again, so I executed a go-around probably not that far over his head. And I was back around for another try. This time a Cessna tried to pull out in front of me to take off, and I basically announced I was landing, and he held short, and finally we made it.
Right when I shut down I got the signal to keep it running, we had riders. Whoops. So I started it back up and we started in on T-6 rides. I was wrong about people not wanting to do it today. I ended up doing 14 rides. I ran rides until I ran low on gas, got gas and ate cool pancakes and sausage while they were fueling me up, got back in and ran rides until I got low on gas again, around 2 pm or so, ate a hot dog while getting gas, gave more rides until they were done, got in Jesse's Cub and flew around with him a bit to make sure I was comfortable signing him off for solo in the Cub again (I was), and then finally flew home. I didn't look at the hobbs in the plane before I left but I wish I would have. It has to be 7 hours or better. My left hand is a little sore from the throttle pressure, and my feet hurt. But it's good.
I wasn't sure we were going to be giving rides after the first one. It was such a cluster getting in, and then once I had a rider, I couldn't get back out. I couldn't get to the end of the runway, because it was a one-way taxiway and everyone was coming at me. I couldn't taxi on the runway because someone was landing on it at intervals that did not allow someone to back taxi. It took me a very, very long time to catch a break and get down there. Finally when I did make it down, I couldn't get out for a long time still due to all the landing traffic. I do the ride, and it's a cluster getting back in again. I ended up having to do maybe 4 go-arounds out of 14 rides today because of people either pulling out in front of me or landing and then taking forever to taxi off the runway. Most go-around practice I've ever had in that airplane. But while I was still waiting to take off on that first ride, I sent Steve a text, I was about done with this whole thing before we even got started. I hadn't really had a headache before that morning, but I did now. With the noise and some of the tension, my head started throbbing a bit, but fortunately somebody there had some Advil for me to take. It took a couple doses, but eventually the head got better.
Things got better rapidly after that first ride. And then I started landing halfway down the runway (or more) and taxiing all the way to the end. It kind of freaked out some of the riders, because I was turning base pointing at the runway, then dropping down and turning and landing before I got to the VOR down there. One guy said "You know, I've never thought about it, I always do these finals where you're lined up a long way out. But why land on the numbers if you have to taxi 6000 feet down afterwards, and why not land halfway down?" So apparently he got an idea. Hopefully not a bad one as he now terrorizes his local airport in a 172 or something. ;)
I guess Ray was interviewing some of my riders over the PA system, which I didn't know. It was apparently good for business, too. I really didn't expect to get 14 rides out of Marion with the DC-3 there, but we sure stayed busy. When we left, Ray came up to me and said he wanted us there next year too, and the year after. He says I'm personable and gracious and he gets a kick out of watching people who are surprised to shocked when I pull off the helmet and have a lot of hair going on and it's obvious I'm a girl. :) I said that surely people would stop being surprised soon, and he said "Maybe, I've heard a few say something like 'That must be that girl that flies the T-6'." I enjoy doing the rides, and I'm also all caught up on doing rides for a day. I think it's Nathan's turn for the Bash coming up. Now, just to convince HIM of that. ;)
We all went to Outback afterwards, which is when it all settled in. The non-stop day of go go go. I kind of felt like lying down on the bench seats, but made it home where it's taken me an hour to write this because I can't concentrate. Me tired.
Irving Washington took this picture, which made me laugh...
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