Flying since Tuesday:

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Today was fifth time lucky as Nav 5 finally went ahead. My last nav was back on December 20, before I took a break for Christmas and New Year, then got down to business with the theory, passing that exam a few weeks ago.

I planned Nav 5 but had it cancelled four times in a row- but today was the day. The set route was from Barwon Heads to Tyabb (landing) to Latrobe Valley (landing) to Longwarry to Barwon Heads, taking all of three hours. The weather was OK, cloud at 1500’ at Barwon Heads while Latrobe Valley had broken cloud at 2000’ AGL. This was as good as the Latrobe Valley weather was going to get, so I decided to just do it. On arrival at Barwon Heads, the wind was moderate with a crosswind on 17 and the clouds had disappeared. It took around an hour to get the latest weather and enter those details into my flight plan. I figured that I would be rusty, with three days short of two months between my last nav.
Tyabb was called to ask for permission to land there. A friendly telephone operator advised me to read ERSA (for their ‘fly neighbourly principals’ which basically means watch the power and keep all circuit traffic to the east). I was determined to keep thinking ahead, which would hopefully counter the accumulated rust, but, unfortunately, I forgot the portable ELT-this was quickly recovered and we were good to go.

C172N VH-ADR had around 150 litres of fuel onboard which would be more than enough for the proposed three hours. I left my SARTIME for 1600 with the team at the office and we were soon rolling down RWY 17, kicking off the crosswind with the rudder and aileron. Climbout was fine and I performed the CLEAROFF checks. Time over the top of YBRS was 1341 and we were soon on the initial heading of 091. We would travel via Arthur’s Seat for this leg to avoid going over the bay- this would require life jackets and would be unnecessary risky if the unfortunate happened. Arthur’s Seat came quickly, and by 1405, we were overhead the unmistakable hill of it. More CLEAROFF checks and then I set course for Tyabb- HDG 059. We were promptly there in 7 minutes, and this one was a landing (landing 2 away from YBRS). The windsock pointed to RWY 17 like at YBRS, so that it was. My circuit was a little close-and my approach a little high as a result. My first landing on asphalt ever (another for this blog of firsts) was smooth- I was happy with it even if it was a little too far down the runway. There was no time for stopping- it was a touch and go so off we went.

Course was set for Latrobe Valley- 084 degrees and I settled in for the longest leg of the trip- 40 minutes. We flew past Western Port and flew right past Tooradin- I could see it from way off having been there by air three times. This was the first airfield that I spotted before my instructor. We were tuned to the local frequency and heard a Jabiru up doing circuits- and a fair bit of other traffic around for a Tuesday afternoon.

To pass the time, my instructor and I played ‘identify the town’ which is always interesting. I suspected that a diversion was coming up, and I was right. I was told to turn at Athlope for Inverloch and then proceed directly home from there. I had no idea where Athlope was and still don’t know now. (does anyone out there know Athlope?) It was impossible to spot from the air, and may have been three houses on the river bank. So, I worked out where Athlope would be in relation to Drouin, a bigger town which I had already spotted near Warragul.

I turned right and headed almost due south for Inverloch. I was a little too early with my turn and we ended up over Wonthaggi, taking a parallel to track to what we should have. From there, going home was easy- just follow the cost. The wind farm and the site for the new desalination plant were very strong landmarks here. We passed over Phillip Island which I hadn’t seen in detail before- impressive before moving through restricted area 323A (not operating today) and back home. The approach into Barwon Heads was a little challenging with the crosswind, but I stuck with it and we got down with only a light bump.

Exactly two hours were on the clock. My instructor was happy with my nav work, and has set me up for the next nav which is the big solo for hour-building from YBRS to Hamilton to Warrnambool to YBRS. It's scheduled for Friday, so hopefully the weather is kind and it can happen then. I still need to do some VOR/ADFstuff, but the VOR radio wasn't working in ADR today, so we had to leave it for some other dual session.

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A couple of people, particularly those who haven't navigated before have asked me what the one-in-sixty rule is that I keep referring to in my posts. So, here is an explaination.

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Today I went up on my first cross country solo flight- a very enjoyable flight indeed. The weather in the morning was in good shape with light variable winds and some cloud higher up. Nothing that could stop this nav from going ahead.

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Today, it was finally time to get NAV 3 underway after the cancellation of yesterday due to the wet weather.  Half of 17/35 at Barwon Heads was still slightly wet said my instructor who had walked the runway this morning. He said to keep one tyre in the grass to avoid getting bogged.

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Nav 2 went ahead today after three attempts were cancelled in a row- the joys of a VFR pilot. The planned route was Barwon Heads to Ballarat to Cobden (land) to Colac (land) and then home to Barwon Heads. This one was with another instructor as the CFI had some work to do. The wind was a south easterly, so we departed on 17 with 160 litres of fuel onboard. We did a turn to intercept the airfield and then did some checks before setting a course of 069 to Ballarat. ETA at Ballarat was at 2:58 after starting the leg at 2:23. The hard work of the initial departure hit again and things were a bit overwhelming, but everything soon settled down as we levelled off at the cruise altitude of 4,500ft (once we were clear of Avalon).  This instructor gave a lot of focus on knowing where you are in three places- the start, a designated fix along the track and the end. Anywhere else was not necessary as long as a constant heading was held. Our designated fix on this leg was Meredith where the Midland Highway re-joined our track to Ballarat. The aim for this nav was to follow a set heading rather than landmark to landmark and use a one-in-sixty correction if things weren’t quite right. After doing some more ‘which town is that’ type work where the aim is to compare as many features as possible on the group to the map to positively identify a location, we were soon at Meredith. The track was slightly off to the right so a correction was used. We were well on track for a Ballarat arrival at 2:58 as the airspeed was spot on at 93 knots. Soon Ballarat was in sight but I couldn’t spot the airport. We continued to follow the heading until the obvious assortment of paved runways came into view. There were a fair few aircraft around as well. The time was exactly 2:58 as planned- that leg having taken 35 minutes. We turned onto a new heading, did the CLEAR checks and set course for Cobden. With the benefit of the tail wind this time, the leg would only take 33 minutes at 109 knots. The designated half way point was made at a crossroads to the east of Lismore and west of the lake. The track of 206 was a little too far left so a one in sixty was applied. A ground speed check on that leg suggested that we were travelling faster than planned, and would arrive in Cobden one minute earlier at 3:30.  Everything was looking great with plenty of visibility until Camperdown came into sight and a wall of bad ‘weather’ quickly closed in around us leaving us no option other than to divert to Colac (or it may have been a sick passenger or the end of daylight that caused the diversion). My heading was slightly off, but it wasn’t too bad as we navigated from point-to-point, soon finding Lake Colac. I had spotted the airfield on the last nav and had no trouble seeing the field again this time. We made the inbound call in preparation for my first landing away from home (except for one at Bacchus Marsh with the instructor doing 75% of the work in lesson 3- doesn’t really count). As I flew over the field, the wind was light and I decided to take Runway 36. However, on the way back over, the instructor suggested that as the wind was so light, we should use the longer Runway 27 with a crosswind. It didn’t take much to quickly change plans and join midfield crosswind for 27. The circuit was a little wide but not bad for my first shot and we made it down on the gravel of 27. We turned around and pulled off the runway to the paved parking area before setting up once again for the trip home. By the time we got back on top of the airfield, it was 3:58, and we expected to be back at Barwon Heads at around 4:21. We once again use a one in sixty over Winchelsea to get back on track, but the ground speed check said that we would arrive at 4:16- a large difference. It turned out that I may have over-estimated the miles to the halfway point as we really arrived at 4:18 but the variation was still within tolerance. We joined the circuit and came into land at Barwon Heads, another 2.3 hours of dual nav flying done and dusted. The nav went well- we didn’t get lost and the procedures are starting to become more routine. The instructor said it was very good, but, the quickening the procedures was required- however, he did say that it was only nav two and that this would come with time. The next nav is going to be interesting to plan as there are a lot of legs. The aim is to go around the controlled airspace at Melbourne without entering it. The nav will be Barwon Heads->Geelong->Bacchus Marsh->Rosslyne Reservoir->Kilmore->Sugarloaf->Williamstown->Meredith->Barwon Heads. Not sure what the landings will be yet-hopefully I will be able to land at Bacchus Marsh to bring back some memories. This will be on Thursday all going to plan, so I had better get ready.

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Today, I finally got away on navigation exercise 1. After a week making sure that my knowledge and skills were up to speed and planning, as well as dealing with bad weather, things seemed too perfect this morning with light winds and no cloud. I rose early and set up the flight plan around the weather conditions. At 2000 feet, winds were 020/15, and latest observations showed next to no wind on the ground.

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I was finally able to get up this afternoon for the first time in a month (on my GFPT, with one passenger). I got a taste of my nav flights to come, as I flew out to the most north-western point in the training area. I hadn't been so far west before, and it was really good to see the rural area from the air, and to cite familiar landmarks along the way. This felt like the start of navigation flying- finally getting further away from the airport for some exciting and challenging lessons.

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In the description of this blog, I've explained that it's a blog of many firsts for an up and coming (I hope) student pilot.

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I’ve been able to take some more passengers up over the last couple of weeks. If you’ve read my previous posts, you’ll know that I hadn’t yet done the Centre of Gravity flight, which I considered a big deal and a whole new way of handling the aircraft.

With two international friends over from Cambodia and England, last Sunday seemed like the perfect time to use the GFPT as a tool to show them the region from above. The weather was very stable as it has been recently, and with the temperature well above the dew point over the last 24 hours, fog wasn’t going to be a problem. For the first part of the flight, I had the instructor and one of the passengers onboard, and it turned out that Centre of Gravity flight isn’t too different to what I would have done with two people onboard. The main differences to note are the slightly longer takeoff roll (especially with the upslope of 35 and the trees to contend with at the end of the runway), sluggish climb and landing, where a slightly faster speed is required and power should be used during the roundout to allow the aircraft to stabilise. After two CoG circuits, I was able to get the two passengers onboard and we went off on my standard 1 hour circuit of the training area, which I am now using for all my passenger flights. I mapped it out on Google Earth first then was able to roughly calculate the flight time based on speed, although I am nowhere near able to do the complex PPL Navigation calculations required for flight planning outside the training area- I am reading up on this at the moment. The flight was successful and I was able to put in a nice smooth landing at the end. Keeping power on while the plane stabilises uses a bit more runway, but creates much smoother and controlled landings with 3 onboard. I have to say that the last two landings I have done have probably been the best in my entire flying career, both with 2 pax.

This week I was finally able to take Mum and brother up for a training area flight. On arrival the plane hadn’t flown in two days, and had about 100 litres of fuel onboard.


Me and Mum before the flight on VH-ADR.
The engine was very cold and reluctant to start on first try, but with an extra prime, we got there, and we were soon on our way out.
My ‘see everything in an hour’ training area passenger flight departs the airport, then follows the coast south west towards the boundary at Anglesea.


Some coastline in the area.

Just before Anglesea, we head turn right to head north up towards Geelong, overflying the ring road, which keeps us well west of both Avalon airspace and any other waterfront sightseeing traffic, also providing many options for a forced landing just in case.



The city
I then descend to around 1300’ and follow the Bellarine Highway east towards Swan Bay. Once the Avalon airspace restriction passes, I can climb higher again, then follow the coast around Swan Bay, Queenscliff and Point Lonsdale. Over Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads, then meeting up with Torquay completes the circuit.
At that stage, I return to the airport, do a full stop landing, and the flight time will have been around 1 hour.

Joining midfield crosswind for Runway 35.
There’s still a few people on my list to come up flying with me, so I’m getting plenty of experience with flying around this training area route.
I probably won’t write up another training area passenger flight again as they do start to get a bit repetitive, but it is good to be able to take up two other people in ADR to the training area.
Here is a video of today’s flight. I'm not yet sure how to embed them into these posts, so simply follow the link.

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