My first flight in 2014

Did you get a chance to fly on New Year's Day?
Our planned lunch fly out to 6 miles away was cancelled due to rain and low cloud. Stu, a Tiger pilot and myself were the only two showed up with airplanes. The rest of the group brought their cars. We took off then come back for a 1 mile initial, break and land. It was the shortest formation flight I have ever done. After finishing our flight we jumped in the car and made the 10 mile drive to the restaurant.




The weather on New Year Eve was better and I did my last flight of the year with Craig who was in his Canadian RV6.

zoomed over couple states on Jan 1st

Mudgee

I departed Bankstown (Sydney) mid morning for lunch at Mudgee.

50 minutes away in the RV-6. Intended to drop in to the Blue Wren Winery on the other side of the road from the Mudgee airport, but they were closed for new years day. Luckily for us, Brad from Hangar House helped us out by loaning us his car so we could drive in to town to eat.

http://www.hangarhouse.com.au -- We'll definitely be back, looks like a great place to spend a few nights.

Returning to Sydney in the afternoon at 7500 with a nice tailwind, the clear weather we experienced on the way out had been overrun by smoke from the bushfires at Girribung Creek and MacDonald River. No visible horizon between Katoomba and Penrith. Clearly still VMC, but murky and grey, like flying under an upturned bowl. Lookout supplemented with flight following from Sydney Center.

Mudgee is a three and a half hour drive from Sydney, and you'd never do it as a day trip, so there's much eyerolling at the office when colleagues ask, "What'd you do on New Years Day?" and I tell them I went to Mudgee for lunch

- mark

January 1, 2014

January1, 8:00AM had a mission to fly and pick up a friend at Gainesville,TX
His new RV 7 was needing some airtime and it was still in my RV Central hanger. I flew the 'Paul Revere' my C 180J logged an hour.

Later flew to Stephenville, Texas for lunch at The Hard 8 BBQ in the 'Borrowed Horse', RV8 logged another hour.

My log shows 147 hours in 2013. Shows 150 hours in 2012. My 2014 New Years resolution is to fly more this year.