On March 15th, the last day before my annual condition inspection is due, Sheryl and I decided we needed to get out of town...via winged flight. Can you believe its been one year since my first flight?...I certainly can't. I'll devote an entire blog post to that in the coming weeks as I work on my annual.
The forecast was for record breaking spring warmth in Denver and beyond. It was a perfect day to fly! And fly we did, all the way to another state. We made the 1.5 hr flight from Denver to Taos, New Mexico for lunch and strolling around town. Neither Sheryl nor I had ever been there, and I knew it would be a wonderfully scenic flight, so the deal was sealed. Taos, here we come!
After some debate about going south to Pueblo and "around" the pointy rocks, I decided to give it a go with a direct route. Since I had never flown this particular route, I wasn't sure how rugged the terrain would be enroute. The sectional looked ok in preflight planning, so I thought, why not give it a "look see." A direct path also would take us right over the Great Sand Dunes National Park, which was on my Colorado aviation bucket list to fly over. Low and behold, the sectional didn't lie, it really wasn't rugged terrain at all. There were plenty of areas I felt comfortable with putting her down if we lost an engine. I would go this route again, without hesitation.
As we left Denver and had been in the air about 15 mins, Sheryl called out traffic at our 1 o'clock position. She is getting good at this. I got a positive visual contact, and it was just a dark speck at that moment. But it grew larger very fast. I took a somewhat leisurely bank to my left as I didn't like our convergence angles. It was a V-tail bonanza about 50-100 feet above us on an almost direct reciprocal heading. As I banked back to my right (basically a side step s-turn so I could watch him), he zoomed past us most likely completely unaware we were there. He never deviated in his flight path, which was probably good since we had a positive visual on him/her.
Sheryl remarked..."he sure was moving fast", I responded "yep, that is a fast plane just like ours." The convergence speed was easily well over 300 kts in this case. No harm done, but if we wouldn't have seen him, I may have pee-ed down my leg a little since we were almost on a direct collision course initially. Keep your eyes open! And no, I never got a traffic callout on ADS-B system.
This is an added tidbit, as I've been asked several times where we crossed? Which pass? Here is a screenshot from our DeLorme tracker/PLB (which I love!) showing our mountain crossing at the Sand Dunes. The topo map shows a great representation of how the geography looked to me in the cockpit. As you can see, we didn't cross at Mosca pass to the south, there wasn't really any need flying the RV.
This mountain crossing was at about 12,500 ft, as we snaked through the canyon. As we popped out the other side of the ridge, the Sand Dunes appeared before our eyes! Kind of snuck up on me as I wasn't expecting them until a few minutes later. This picture shows what the view looked like as we first sighted them.
Another shot as we descended down for a better look and some loitering. Its pretty crazy, these sand dunes are in the middle of nowhere and just seem so out of place in the Rocky Mountains. No doubt, they are very pretty as seen from the air.
Looking straight down the wing in high bank turn...just because I can.
We circled here for a few minutes taking in the amazing spectacle of nature before getting back on course for Taos, which wasn't far away by now. I really like this picture. actually shot by Sheryl (not moi).
Arriving at Taos airport, elevation 7000 ft, there is no control tower and it does not have a crosswind runway. I really thought Taos was bigger, I was a little surprised to be honest. The FBO was great and our crew car was the nicest I have ever used. They set a 2 hr limit to call them in case someone was waiting, which we did, and since no one was, we were given the go ahead to extend our usage to 3+ hrs. Nice of them.
On the suggestion of our good friend and fellow RV7 builder, Brian Beatty, we stopped at Orlando's for some authentic New Mexican food. Brian did not steer us wrong, darn good grub! I am sure we will visit again.
This was our crew car, with only 16,000 miles on it! Turns out that the local Hertz rental car company stationed at the airport lends these vehicles on a rotation basis to the FBO. Now that is a sweet deal! Never seen this kind of arrangement before.
Cool sculpture in town...Taos, like many New Mexico cities, is known for its art.
I grew up idolizing Kit Carson and the mountain men of the 19th century west. I did not know that Kit Carson spent some of his last days in Taos. We did the tour for $7 and it was pretty interesting to see his house.
Heading back to the airport about 2pm, it had been a great day so far. I will admit to Taos not being what I expected. It was a small city and not as modern as I anticipated. The shops and the history was cool, but I think you would get real bored here in a short amount of time. We may visit again, but it won't be high on my list of return destinations. I would say I was lukewarm to it at best. I'm not saying you shouldn't give it a whirl, but I've seen cooler places.
A nice panoramic shot of Wablosa on the ramp on a absolutely PERFECT day as the temps were about 65 degrees in Taos.
A flight for life heli shared the ramp with us...another scenic shot. I made the comment, if this thing is coming for you, you are having a bad day indeed. But I bet it would be a welcome sight! Hats off to the men and women that come to our rescue when we are in need.
Obligatory selfie on the return trip with my new red/black Taos hat...Sheryl was wearing her "Fly Girl" hat that I bought for her last year at Oshkosh.
The flight back was again, uneventful, with a few more bumps in the warmer air, but still pretty smooth. What a great day of flying! Not many people can say they had lunch in a different state! We both had a blast and days like these really makes all the hard work of building this bugger worth it.
After we got back and tucked the plane in the hangar, I thought it was such a nice day and I really was enjoying the warm weather, I said, "how about a beer?"We ended up having a couple each and talked about the day before heading to dinner. It really was a perfect aviation day, one only possible because of an airplane I built. KPR, its all worth it!
