Aviation: November 2008 Archives
Friday was the big day for our trip to Austin. The weather was perfect as there wasn't a cloud in the entire state of Texas and the wind was pretty calm. The first leg was a short one to Mesquite Metro Airport (KHQZ) to pick up Tim, friend who was to join me on the trip. Shortly after takeoff from McKinney (KTKI) I opened my flight plan with Fort Worth Flight Service, and made my way to KHQZ, landing shortly after for a quick restroom stop and to pick up Tim. From there was set off direct to Georgetown Municipal Airport (KGTU) which I planned to overfly and use as a checkpoint before contacting Austin Approach and heading toward Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (KAUS).
All went well with the flight except for two things. First, after taking off from KHQZ, I asked for flight following from DFW Regional Approach, which was granted, however, after clearing the Class Bravo shelf to the south, I told them I was climbing to 6500 feet for the remainder of my flight. It was at that point that I was contacted by Approach and given the following instruction, "Three-November-Bravo, radar services terminated, squawk VFR, frequency change approved, have a good night." They just cut me off without handing me off to Fort Worth Center (ZFW). I was a little miffed, but no problem... I found the frequency for ZFW and switched over. Just as I was about to contact them, I heard one of the controllers over the radio say, "Any VFR flight asking for flight following, don't bother, we're too busy tonight." Well.... too busy.... well screw you too!!!! Ah well, at least I was on an active flight plan. So we continued our flight from KHQZ direct to KGTU.
We were having a nice, smooth flight enjoying the views of the various Friday Night Lights along the way when we came upon KGTU and it was time to call Austin Approach. I did so reporting the following, "Austin Approach, Cessna Seven-Three-Three-November-Bravo is a Cessna 172 Slant Golf, VFR at six thousand, five hundred, heading south, inbound for Austin-Bergstrom International, requesting traffic advisories". I was given a new transponder code to squawk and asked to turn to heading 120°. A short time later I was asked to descend to an altitude at or below 2000 feet. Basically, the routed me to the northeast of the airport, then turned me toward the airport until I made visual contact (i.e. located the beacon). They then turned me south, paralleling the runways, turning me to the base leg of the pattern before handing me off to Austin Tower.
This is where it got interesting. I was on about a 2 mile final when I was waived off and told to turn east and climb to an altitude at or below 2000. In fact, they closed the airport to all traffic because of an aircraft that rolled onto the grass when it was turning to a taxiway. Once I got a couple of miles away from the airport, I was asked to make a "racetrack pattern" to the east until further notice. They got the plane cleared and had some trucks roll down the runway in search of FOD (foreign object debris). After that, the tower controller asked me to contact approach again to get re-lined up for landing. They wanted to get a couple of planes down before us that were low on fuel. I did as they asked and got sequenced again behind a 737 and handed off to the tower again on the base leg of the pattern, then came in and landed on the big runway (35L) without incident and without, once again, a landing light, which seems to have a problem working on the plane I flew. Unfortunately, the flight was extended from about 2 hours to about 2 and a half hours.
From the airport we picked up our rental car, checked into our respective hotels (Tim and I), and then hit Sixth Street for some good music and food. This place was amazing. We had some dinner at the Iron Cactus and then found an Irish pub where a really cool band was playing some texas blues was playing. Then found very bluesy-R&B sounding band was playing at a place called the Dirty Dog. We stayed there for about an hour and then called it a night and returned to our respective hotels to get some rest for the big game against Baylor.
The game was interesting... I've been to college football games before, but none with the pageantry and presentation that this one had. The band was huge, the crowd was huge... and really into the game. We were in the upper deck, but I still felt like, from our seats, our view was pretty good. Below are a couple of photos from the iPhone. In the end, the good guys won, but most people in attendance agreed that the team wasn't playing up to its potential and were still critical... and for the most part, they were right. I also see why most of the players at UT end up staying for all four years of their eligibility. They are treated like absolute royalty in Austin, both as a team and as individuals. As big a city as it is, they are the only game in town and they are beloved... and most people followed the mantra, "Come Early. Be Loud. Stay Late. Wear Orange." We left the game when the team hit 49 about midway through the 4th quarter.... obviously we didn't stay late. But we did so to have time to enjoy another big Austin Institution, the original Chuy's Tex-Mex Restaurant on Barton Springs Road (where, incidentally, Jenna Bush was arrested for attempting to buy alcohol under age). We made it to Chuy's and had a great meal, then headed back to the airport, where I did some flight planning and we got under way.
This time, I skipped overflying KGTU in favor of a direct route to KHQZ and the flight was done entirely under flight following, so I had air traffic control eyes on me just about the entire way until I cancelled flight following within 10 miles of KHQZ. Since my flight was done under flight following, it was tracked by flight aware, just like all the big airlines. You can see my route by clicking here. The really nice thing about the trip was my fuel burn was really good. I was able to lean the mixture using the technique relayed to me by Robert, who learned it from our CFI, by paying attention to the EGT indicator (Exhaust Gas Temperature) and leaning the mixture to slightly below (on the rich side) the peak EGT. With this method I estimate my fuel flow was just under 9 gallons per hour, which is pretty good for a 180 horsepower engine.
We landed at KHQZ so that I could drop off Tim and refuel for $3.30/gallon before returning to KTKI and buttoning up the plane and going home. The weekend could not have gone better in terms of making a cross-country flight and having a good time at sixth street and a football game.
