Flight Time–Time Building With Nick

Today I flew with Nick in N8049N. The day started early, as I needed to be in DeLand by 7:00 AM and I was leaving from home. Today was a repeat of our flight last month, so I was hopeful that we would not be repeating the magneto failure, or any other failure for that matter.

Nick's Piper Cherokee N8049N

Our plan for the day was to get cheap gas, fly for three to four hours, get cheap gas again, and return to DeLand. The first leg was the same as last time. We flew to Williston and got gas. This time however, the engine started and we were able to continue.

Our second destination was Okeechobee, with a quick stop at Punta Gorda. For this flight, I filed an IFR flight plan in Foreflight, which included two waypoints: Ocala VOR and Lakeland VOR. I received two emails stating that the flight plan had been accepted.

Soon after taking off, Nick called to pick up our clearance. Jacksonville Approach read our clearance to us, and I attempted to write it down. Although I was fully ready to write, I could not understand the route and was totally thrown off my game. Rather than clearing us to the Ocala VOR then as filed, he cleared us to FARCY or VARCE or something I’ve never heard of before. He even spelled it phonetically, but all I caught was A-R-E. Nick looked at me and I just shrugged. He asked Approach to repeat the first part. I still had a hard time hearing it, but luckily, Nick picked it up and read it back correctly. The waypoint turned out to be VARZE. It is not on the Victor airway between Ocala VOR and Lakeland VOR. Instead, it is on the Tango airway that doesn’t even go through Lakeland VOR. Who knows why he chose that waypoint. So now, when preparing to accept a clearance, I will take a much closer look at all of the waypoints not only on the requested route, but also those near the route.

Nick flew to VARZE, then continued direct to Punta Gorda. Along the route, we were in an out of the slowly building cumulous clouds. We were handed off to Tampa Approach, Miami Center, then Fort Myers Approach. As we got nearer to Punta Gorda, Approach asked our intentions, and we said that we’d like to fly the ILS 4 approach. This was approved and we were given vectors to the southwest to eventually intercept the localizer. We were handed off to Tower and cleared for the option. Nick did a touch and go, then we were handed back to Approach. Approach handed us off to Miami Center, where we were told that he would not be able to provide services all the way to Okeechobee, so we decided to cancel IFR.

After filling up the tanks at Okeechobee, Nick offered to let me sit in the left seat for the flight back to DeLand. The winds were picking up, and I didn’t want to risk damaging his plane, so I was a little tentative at first. Eventually I decided to accept the offer. I flew back to DeLand, and we called it a day.

With this flight, I have now surpassed the magical 800-hour milestone. Now I can start filling out applications to all the companies that require 800 hours.

The flight tracks are shown below.

DeLand to Williston

Williston to Punta Gorda, then Okeechobee

Okeechobee to DeLand

Flight Time: 6.3 hours
Total Time: 805 hours