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Gang,
Have to share this. Today was probably the best flying day of the year so far in SoCal. Wouldn't you know it, my 27 month old son crawls in bed with me this morning and says "I go fying, da-da". "You want to go flying?" "Yes, da-da, me go fying, in da air-pane, up, up up!" Well, who can resist that? :)
Breakfast in our bellies, I packed his bag and off we went. After stopping by the Corona airport for some oil, we arrived to a very busy Chino morning. Hangars open all over the place....lots of people wanting to take advantage of a crystal clear day in the mid-70's.
After Caden helped me push the big metal doors to the hangar open, I removed the stick from the right seat of 122LL, secured his car seat in place, and we were ready to go. As a side note, I can't tell you how happy I am that Bose makes their headset small enough to fit a toddlers head....I would not take him flying without them! Anyway, he excitedly dawned his headset as we strapped in and got ready to go.
Took a few turns to get her started...it's been almost a whole week since I've flown her and I think she was mad at me! "Chino ground, good morning, Legacy 122LL, Yankee, flight following to French Valley, north hangars." "Legacy 122LL, good morning, thanks for Yankee, taxi to 26L via Bravo, Delta, Golf, Echo." As we taxied out and turned on Echo to parallel to 26L, we look up to see a P-40 in the break....nice! Unfortunately, he was one of 8 or 10 airplanes inbound and we literally held short for 12 minutes while everyone and their brother descended on Chino.
"Go da-da, go." Trying to explain "hold short for landing traffic" to a two year old is a bit challenging. "Oh buddy, look at the butterflies over here." Uhhhhh, "look at the airplane" as I point to the Chelton PFD screen. "C'mon da-da, go."
Fresh out of things to keep him occupied and starting to get warm in the cabin, we get relief. "November 122LL, 26L, position and hold." "26L, position and hold, 2LL, hallelujah." Takeoff clearance was right behind it. This is where Caden has become a little frightened in the past, but as I rolled in the MP and the IO-550 ran up to 2680 R's, he was just fine! The wheels broke ground right at 70 knots and, as the earth fell away smartly below, the entire LA basin, complete with snow capped mountains from the Angeles-Crest National Forrest to the northwest to the Banning pass in the east, started coming into view like being in a glass elevator going up a downtown high rise. Flaps up through 120 and a sweeping turn to the left puts us on course for F70....12 minutes away. Raising Caden's car seat has done wonders, he's looking down at the ground on both sides as I do slow dutch rolls, "we going up, up, up!" "Yeah, buddy, you having fun?" "Yeeees" he slyly says with a big smile. As we leveled off at 5.5 his eyes became droopy. "Yeeees" was to be his last word of the flight.
The pattern was full as we arrived in the French Valley area....slowing down in a descent in this thing ain't easy unless you want to jerk the power to idle...(I don't care what some dude said in an article about shock cooling...I ain't abusin' my engine! Cracked cylinders, maybe not, but there a LOT more to an engine than cylinders! I digress...) Speed brakes out at 202 KIAS and I enter the 45 at 165 knots with 2 in front of me. Flaps 10, turn to downwind at 140, gear down, flaps full at 120, and I smartly decelerate to 100 knots where the paddles come down and MP goes to 19 to hold altitude....feels funny to have so much power in and going so slow in a Legacy!
On about a mile final with the Cessna in front of me about half way down the runway, a Lancair 360 pulls out in front of me. "Get a move on, Lancair" "No problem, GI" comes the reply. Turns out it was perfectly timed, he broke ground just as I passed the numbers and I squeaked it on for my soundly sleeping son. Next time a radio call would be nice, tho'.
As we pulled into transient parking on a Saturday at noon, right in front of the restaurant, it was like we were Air Force One, or something. Seemed every eye in the joint was on us....it's good to be us, Legacy drivers....don't suck a'tall! :)
As I opened the canopy and sat up on the seat back looking down at my precious boy with a light breeze blowing through his dirty blonde hair, I couldn't help but get a bit choked up. A beautiful day with my beautiful son on his first "cross country" plane ride with "da-da". A life long dream fulfilled.
Just another unforgettable day in the life of a Legacy driver.
photo_070.jpg
Taken from my camera phone on taxi out at French Valley...
Barry Hancock
Legacy 122LL
PS On final in to Chino Caden looks out the right side and says, waving..."hiiii, coowws!" Too cute!
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