Across the Country - Day 3

Bozeman, MT - Rapid City, SD
Mileage - 515
Miles Driven - 1,208

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Day 3 started cool and beautiful. We ate as much as we could at the motel, then got some gas and hit the road. Since we arrived at night, it was good to see the scenery. I'm pretty much convinced that the other time I was in Bozeman, I wasn't really in Bozeman. I think the airport is actually not in Bozeman. I guess I'm saying that nothing looked familiar.

After passing Livingston, the terrain changed into vast vistas of range land. We could see the mountains to the south as we drove through mostly barren land, with occasional Black Angus cows and numerous herds of Antelope. Oh home on the range, where the deer and the antelope play... Somewhere along the way, we also passed Little Big Horn, the famous site of Custer's Last Stand.

Leaving Billings, I started to wonder if I'd ever see civilization again. I've never seen an interstate exit leading to a dirt road with absolutely nothing else in sight. This is one section of highway where you'd better fill the tank every chance you get, otherwise you may find yourself all alone.

Sheridan, Wyoming was a bit of a disappointment. I was expecting a much larger city, for some reason. There really isn't much there.

In Buffalo, we stopped for some gas and a stretch. We parked at the information center, across from the museum and city hall, and walked down to the park by the stream. Andrew found a tall traffic cone to play with and I found a comfortable spot in the shade under a birch tree that was just starting to turn yellow.

Gillette was very interesting. Growing up in Ohio, I've seen my share of strip mining for coal, but this topped everything I can remember. From the interstate, you pass a large hole filled with coal and mining equipment. Coming in and out of the mine, I counted five trains, at least a hundred cars long, full of coal. Then we passed a rail yard with hundreds more cars - some full, some empty.

Sundance was a nice break from the range. It is a nice touch of green after a million miles of tan. Soon after, we saw signs for Devil's Tower and were lucky enough to catch a breif glimpse of it in the distance.

Finally we entered South Dakota. One of the first towns is Sturgis. I guess you have to have a Harley Davidson to understand the appeal of this small town.

By the time we reached Rapid City, it was quite dark. Rapid City was - so I thought at the time - the return of civilation. It had every modern chain store known to mankind. It was extremely overwhelming and left a bad taste in my mouth. There was absolutely nothing unique about this town, as far as I could tell.

Continue...

Across the Country - Day 2

Moses Lake, WA - Bozeman, MT
Mileage - 502
Miles Driven - 693


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Today was our first full day of driving, and I'm exhausted. The day started with a wake-up call from Tom Bodette (Motel 6) at 7:00AM. At 8:30, we were in our seats at Perkins Restaurant in Moses Lake, WA. Our friends, the Weeda's, met us a few minutes later. We ate and caught up and finally said our good-byes around 9:55.

At 10:00, we were once again eastbound on I-90. We should have got gas, but we didn't. Ninety miles later, I was beginning to think I'd be going for a long walk instead of a long drive, but luckily we found a gas station before the dreaded silence of a fuel-starved engine came to be. Soon afterwards, we said farewell to Washington and hello to Idaho. At only 69 miles wide, Idaho quickly disappeared in our rear view mirror. At the Idaho - Montana border, we stopped for lunch at Lookout Pass and rolled the clock an hour forward.

About an hour later, we pulled off the highway in Missoula, Montana for gas and a burrito. The drive from Missoula to Butte was spectular. The scenery was amazing, especially with the fantastic light from the sun beginning to set. In Butte, Montana, we crossed the continental divide, then stopped briefly for a potty break. Then it was back on the highway to Bozeman, Montana. We arrived safely, but exhausted, at 9:30PM.

Continue...

Across the Country - Day 1

Bothell, WA - Moses Lake, WA
Mileage - 191
Miles Driven - 191


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Today was our first driving day. The plan was to visit with the Straka's for a few hours and hit the road by 3:30PM. As usual, the plans didn't work out. Tom and family came up and we went to the park to play and take pictures. On the way, Tom stopped at Car Toys and bought me a Sirius satellite radio. Cool! Our departure time came and went while we tried to shoehorn a ton of stuff into a half ton trailer.

Finally we hit the road at 6:00PM. Our first stop was Issaquah to briefly meet the Lindleys and drop off the Verizon FiOS router. We stopped at the Verizon Wireless store, but they wouldn't accept it. We said our good-byes to the Lindley's in the parking lot and hit the highway. It was dark before we reached the Snoqualmie summit.

Andrew fell asleep in Bellevue and finally woke up in Eastern Washington and asked, "Where in the world are we?" Then he started noticing 'planets' in the dark black sky and the red lights on the windmills.

We arrived at the Moses Lake Motel 6 at 10:00PM.

Continued...

Moving Out Day

Susan and I spent all evening last night - until midnight - packing boxes. Our neighbors stopped by and helped pack the dishes. Susan couldn't sleep, so she got out of bed at 4:00AM and continued packing. I got up at 6:00AM and helped out with the remaining kitchen items and moved back into the garage.

At 9:00AM, the new owner stopped by and gave us a check for some of the items that we no longer need and don't want to transfer back East. He bought the lawn mower, a bunch of gardening hand tools, a hose, the compact deep freezer, the computer desk, and the off-the-air HDTV tuner.

At 10:00AM, the moving truck arrived and backed into our cul-de-sac. By noon, the movers had everything out of the living room. I ordered some pizzas from Papa Johns and we all grabbed a bite. Mom called to catch up and ask us to keep her in the loop as we drive across the country. She also asked me to take lots of pictures, so I need to go grab my camera and get some pictures.

At 3:30PM, 

the movers finished up and the big truck drove away. We scouted out a good location and shot some video while it drove out our cul-de-sac, around the corner, and eventually out of site. With some good luck, we'll be seeing that truck again in about 10-14 days.

At 4:30PM, Susan's former co-workers arrived to pick up the Infinity. While they were here, we showed them our large pile of give-away items. Like a flock of hungry vultures, they descended on our stuff and one by one, started claiming items and loading their van. :-) Before long, the pile was nearly gone. Then we mentioned that there was still a bunch of food in the chest freezer and a couple styrofoam coolers in the give-away pile. They claimed nearly everything. Then we mentioned there was another freezer in the kitchen. Quickly, everything inside was carted out. Then we mentioned that there was still some food left in the cupboard. Like magic, that vanished before my eyes. Thanks to Susan's friends, we now have nothing left to throw away. Fantastic.

At 6:30PM, Andrew and I went to Bellevue to pick up our tiny U-Haul trailer. We picked the smallest one available. It weighs about 500 pounds, giving us about a 400 pound payload. Although the trailer looks tiny in the picture, it is actually pretty big. It will haul about the same amount of stuff as a small pickup truck.

Last Day at Cisco Systems

After over eleven years, today was my last day at Cisco. My manager took me and a bunch of my co-workers to lunch. It was my choice, so I chose The Spaghetti Factory. I remember going there for lunch back when I was first hired at Active Voice in 1997. Lunch was great, and I even got to see three trains roll by.

After work, I stopped at Regal Air to say good-bye, then back home to try to wrap up the packing.

Commercial Training - Day 25

Summary

Scheduled Time: 8:00AM - 10:00AM
Actual Hours Ground: 0.3
Actual Hours Flight: 1.2
Total Hours Flight: 16.0

Today may have been my last official training day. Brian and I went out into the hazy morning in search of good pylons. Unfortunately, the valleys were full of fog, so we practiced our high maneavers instead. Steep turns went very well, and chandelles and lazy eights were pretty good, too.

Since we really wanted to do turns on pylons, we headed north up past Lake Stevens to find some farmland that was not hidden by the fog. We found an area and did the turns - they went very well.

Back at the airport, I attempted four power off 180 degree landings. The first two went very well, the third was short and resulted in a go-around, and the fourth was a little high and resulted in a longer-than-acceptable landing.

A couple hours later, Brian called with details about my check ride. It will be at noon on September 23. The end is now clearly in sight.

Commercial Training - Day 24

Summary

Scheduled Time: 4:00PM - 7:00PM
Actual Hours Ground: 1.5
Actual Hours Flight: 1.1
Total Hours Flight: 14.8

Today took my final stage check before the check ride. I met Lawrence and we went over several areas or interest, then headed out to fly.

The flight was very similar to the last flight. We started by simulating the planned flight to Sandpoint, ID. After simulating opening the flight plan, we simulated picking up flight following and were on our way. After a few miles, we stopped simulating and started doing commercial manuevers.

We started with slow flight, followed by a power-off stall. These went well, so we moved on to steep turns. One was just OK, but the other did not meet the test standards. We then moved on to chandelles and lazy 8's; both of which went pretty good. Finally, we attempted a steep spiral, but a low flying plane entered the space I had planned to decsend into, so we scrubbed the manuever after one turn.

Back at the airport, we attempted to do some 180 degree turns to landing, but the pattern was too full, so we did a soft field landing followed by a short field landing and called it a day.

Well, it looks like I will be needing another flight or two to polish my maneuvers.

Commercial Training - Day 23

Summary
Scheduled Time: 6:00PM - 8:00PM
Actual Hours Ground: 0.3
Actual Hours Flight: 1.4
Total Hours Flight: 13.7

Last night was a wonderful night for flying. The weather was absolutely perfect. Brian and I started the flight by simulating the steps to follow a hypothetical flight plan. I noted the takeoff time and time at first waypoint, then noted the actual time to the first waypoint and adjusted the expected time to the next waypoint. Meanwhile, I pretended to open the flight plan and pick up flight following from Seattle Approach. Then we imagined that the weather was too bad to cross the mountains, so we simulated updating the flight plan back to Paine Field. On the way back to Paine Field, we had a simulated engine failure and circled down over a small private airfield in Fall City.

Then it was back to commercial maneauvers. We did eights on pylons, chandelles, steep spirals, and lazy eights. All went very smoothly. But then we noticed a slight film of oil building on the windshield, so we headed back to the airport early - just in case.

My next step is to take a mock checkride. If that goes well, my real checkride will follow shortly.

Commercial Training - Day 22

Summary
Scheduled Time: 5:30PM - 7:30PM
Actual Hours Ground: 0.8
Actual Hours Flight: 0.0
Total Hours Flight: 12.3

Yesterday was another ground school day for me. My homework was to plan a flight to somewhere I've never been to before, so I chose Sandpoint, ID. I did all the planning tasks by hand - which is something I haven't done since my private pilot training days in the 90's. It took an hour and a half to gather all the weather, plan the route, calculate the distances, headings, speeds, and fuel burn for each leg. I didn't even get to finish the weights and balances before it was time to go to the airport.

I arrived a little early, so I did finish the weights and balances before my lesson. Then it was time to go over the plan. I was asked questions like, "Why did you choose this altitude for this leg?" and lots more like that. Then I was asked to define various symbols that I found on the map, and explain the various airspaces. Overall, it was strictly review and went very well.