Flight Time–Homestead

Every time that I look at my Visited Airports map, I see a lack of pins in southeast Florida. I think about flying down the Keys, but I just haven’t gotten around to it yet. Today, I planned to change that by flying to Homestead.

My mom and I were airborne from Valkaria at 11:45 AM. I climbed to 6,500 feet and enjoyed the cool, smooth air. The plan was to descend below the Fort Lauderdale Class C airspace and the Miami Class B airspace. This required me to fly west of Miami at 2,500 feet, below the 3,000-foot shelf. As we descended below 5,000 feet, the ride became turbulent - as expected. I pulled the power back to lessen the effect of the bumps. I wanted to stay on the edge of civilization, rather than fly over the Everglades, but that would have required flying below 2,000 feet - an altitude I didn't want to get down to. To make matters even more interesting, there was a wildfire burning near Wellington, which was creating a 15-mile-long smoke screen from the ground up to 5,000 feet. I heard several other pilots mention it, and some asked for airspace transitions to avoid it. I decided that the visibility through it was sufficient and continued on through it. We were out the other side within a minute.

Once beyond the Class B airspace, I prepared to land at Homestead. Homestead has a grass runway parallel to Runway 10 with planes towing gliders into the sky. I paid close attention to make sure there were no planes or gliders approaching as I flew the downwind leg. We landed and taxied onto the first ramp that we saw. The ramp was empty, and I couldn't see the fuel pump. I looked closely at the airport diagram, but it wasn't clear where it was. I took a chance and taxied west. Soon I saw the pump. 

After topping off the tanks, I pushed the plane into a parking spot while Mom headed for the FBO. When I joined her, I saw a food truck. She headed for it, and I pulled out the iPad to start planning the flight back home.

I knew that I didn't want to return via the same route that I flew earlier. I asked a couple instructors what they'd do, then I decided to fly over the Miami Class B airspace at 7,500 feet. With Homestead being so close to the edge of the Class B airspace, I would need to fly south towards the top of the Keys first to gain altitude before flying north.

After a quick snack and bathroom stop, we headed back out to the ramp. I checked the fluid levels in the plane then prepared for departure. We took off at 2:20 PM. As planned, I turned south after takeoff and continued to climb out over the water. While climbing, I turned left towards Key Largo and continued climbing to the northeast. By the time we reached the Ocean Reef Club, I was at 7,500 feet. I turned directly towards Miami Internation Airport, then contacted Miami Approach and asked for flight following to Valkaria. Approach was busy and told me to stand by. A few minutes later, I called again and was given a squawk code. Being above the Class B airspace, I was able to fly the course that I wanted with no inputs from Approach. Unfortunately, there was a strong headwind at that altitude, so we were only doing 95 knots over the ground. I didn't mind, since we had full tanks and beautiful weather.

Once past Miami, I turned slightly east towards West Palm Beach. Other than a frequency change, we were not told where to go by ATC. We did get a traffic advisory at one point. There was a Virgin Airlines A330 heading our way at our altitude, but it was descending, so it was no factor.

Just south of West Palm Beach, Approach told me to fly heading 360. We remained on this heading until we passed the north edge of their Class C airspace, and I was handed off to the next controller. I asked to descend to 6,500 feet and resume own navigation. I was told to proceed on course. We continued along the Intercoastal all the way up to Sebastian, at which point I cancelled flight following.

I started to descend for the approach into Valkaria when Mom suggested that we continue to Cape Canaveral. She wanted to see if there were any cruise ships in port. We still had three hours of fuel in the tanks, so I said, "Sure!" I leveled off at 3,500 feet to cross over Patrick Space Port Base. I was listening to Orlando Approach, and I heard a "heavy" heading for Patrick. I thought that would be interesting to see. I looked at Foreflight and saw a plane labeled "Grizzly" and thought that could be a military plane. Sure enough, it turned towards Patrick's Runway 3. The huge C-17 flew under us, over the runway, out over the ocean, then turned southwest on the downwind leg.

Clear of Patrick's Class D airspace, I descended to 2,000 feet and flew slowly past the port. There were no cruise ships in port, but it was still interesting to see the port from low and slow. We continued west along FL 528, hoping to see a Brightline train. We didn't, but we did see a long freight train. Then we turned south and flew along the St. John River, past Viera, over Lake Washington, and around the Melbourne Class D airspace. We landed at Valkaria at 5:05 PM.

So now I have a pin in my Visited Airports map at Homestead. I still have several more general aviation airports to visit in that area. I didn't like flying low over the Everglades, so I'll probably stick to the high route, or wait until I can go there IFR.

The flight tracks are below.

Flight Time: 4.8 hours
Total Time: 712 hours