Photo by Darin Scheer
The PIREPs over the last few days had talked about the standard wide temperature swings that one experiences in the desert. Reno forecasts had been calling for highs in the mid-70’s, lows in the mid-40’s. I suspected it might get a little colder being further out in the desert and further removed from the Sierra Nevada Range, so I brought two sleeping bags, a cold weather bag and a medium weather bag. As the sun set you felt how rapidly the temperature changes in the dry air. Luckily the 5½ cords of split Ponderosa Pine was prefect for the social campfire and warmth.
Friday morning we awoke to a crisp 19 degrees and light frost on all the aircraft. I crawled out of the sleeping bag, into long johns, a couple layers of clothes, hats and gloves and it was time to fire up the jet boil stove and make some coffee. Before heading over to the fire, we untied N4497B and turned her around, exposing the wings to the rising sun. Kevin Quinn, the mastermind and host of this event held a daily safety brief and outlined the planned flying activities. A breakfast fly out to a private strip in the Sierra Nevada range along the CA/NV border was planned. Those that chose not to participate had near limitless options to explore on their own. The breakfast destination, Bodad is a 2600’ long grass/dirt strip located in the northern end of a valley at Frenchman Lake. It sits at 5900’ and is considered a one-way strip. Land over the meadow to the north, takeoff south. With the days forecast of sunny skies, light winds and high pressure, the aircraft would be experiencing density altitudes of 6500-7500’. I know my airplanes capabilities at light loads and low DA’s really well. I am also pretty comfortable with it at high DA’s and heavy weights as well. It seems like the only time I really flew at high DA’s was on long trips where I was usually operating at max gross weight. So I was really anxious to see how my airplane would perform at lighter weights at these high DA’s. With my brother and I, and 20 gals of fuel upon landing, I knew getting into the strip wouldn’t be any problem and I was pretty sure I could take both of us out, even with my stock 145HP engine, aided with the climb prop and my proficiency. My plan make sure was to do a test departure by myself after breakfast to get a performance baseline. Around the campfire that morning I had already talked to fellow FATPNW member Rob Burson, he had an extra seat in his airplane for my brother if I wasn’t comfortable with the performance margins in mine. People started leaving the lakebed around 9:30 climbing to the west in search of food. The organizers had set up discrete frequencies for deconfliction, based on either a west or east of the lake flight. This safety plan was beautifully executed as 30 some airplanes of differing performance, experience and plans all headed for the same destination over a half hour period. The multiple position calls ensured a safe orderly arrival for all. The low spot in the last ridge headed west set us up perfectly for a left downwind over the towering Ponderosa pines and yellow meadows. The meadow on the south end of the strip provided a nice clear flight path to the runway. Looking for the bridge where the creek flows under the runway, I picked out my touchdown point just past it. There was lots of runway, so no real reason to get that slow, 30 degrees of flaps and 60MPH made for a nice round out with minimal float before touching down. I added power from mid-field and beyond to reach my parking area at the north end turnaround and shutdown, ready for breakfast. The hosts have a small, simple cabin with a large deck. The kitchen aroma told the tale of hotcakes, bacon, sausage and eggs. OJ and coffee rounded out the menu. The great food, sunshine and conversation made it very tempting to kick back and spend the whole day at this mountain retreat. As the last of the guest were sitting down I headed back down to my airplane for my performance test. A rolling takeoff to line up with the runway and 10 degrees of flaps had the airplane feeling ready to fly in about 700’, a gentle pull to 30 flap and she gently lifted off. A low ground effect acceleration till flaps up and a good climb speed by the end of the strip confirmed I had plenty of performance margins for both my brother and I. I performed a quick right 90, left 270 back to final and landed. We watched a few of the many cub types and big 180/185’s depart and then we climbed in, fired up and waited for our turn. At the 1,000-foot mark I pulled flaps as the left wheel lifted off, but the airplane immediately told me that was slightly pre-mature, as she mushed along. A slight forward yoke input placed the mains back on the runway for another 300 feet and she easily flew off. We cleared the fence with 70mph and slowly, but safely climbed over the trees at the south end of the meadow. A J-3 Cub and us were the only low horsepower aircraft to go into Bodad that morning. But flown properly, just about any aircraft is capable with a qualified pilot.
Upon departure from Bodad we started a slow climb towards Truckee CA and Lake Tahoe. As an avid skier and snowmachiner, we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to circumnavigate this beautiful landmark. The water was as Tahoe Blue as ever. The radio silence broke occasionally with a position report from other aircraft also touring the lake. There was a 2-ship of cub-like airplanes ahead of us down low, and a few faster guys that passed us overhead, opposite direction. I had never landed at South Lake Tahoe Airport, KTVL, but today was not the day to do it. The south winds had picked up and were gusting up to 20mph. While doable if need be, I didn’t need to go combine turbulence and high DA performance just to snag another piece of runway. As we exited the lake back towards Truckee, we descended down the Truckee river, along Interstate 80 until it hooked a hard right towards Reno. We continued northward around the hill and landed at Reno-Stead for fuel. I have been to Reno during the air races, it was weird to see it so quiet and lonely. As we taxied out to Rwy 28 I pointed out Hoover Hill to my brother and explained how Bob would dive below the hill, out of sight of the fans during his performances in years past. Little did I know that we would lose this aviation great in a few short days. The last time I saw Bob was a couple years ago as I performed at the Reno Air Races with the Patriots Jet Team. Bob was a friend of the teams’ and it was always an honor to have him in our debriefs, giving us still valid advise, or simply hanging out. He was even more of a gentleman, than he was a great pilot. RIP Sir! Once airborne, we flew backwards around the 2nd half of the racecourse before continuing our climb northbound back to Dead Cow Lake. We landed after about 3 hours of great flying and exploring new places and proceeded to fire up the BBQ and tap into the cooler.
Saturday was STOL day and a balmy 25 degrees at sunrise. The Fly-In features both a traditional STOL competition and a STOL drag race event. Following breakfast and coffee, all the competing pilots met at the campfire for the day’s safety briefings and race briefings. Following the briefing I went out across the playa and practiced some racing techniques and burned some fuel to be lighter for the competitions.
The STOL Races were the first event. This features two aircraft starting from a stationary position at the start/finish line. Competitors takeoff and fly three quarters of a mile to the mid-way line. They must land AFTER the mid-way line and come to a complete stop on runway heading. Once they stop, they execute a left 180-degree turn and takeoff racing back to the start/finish line. They then must land AFTER the finish line and once again come to a complete stop on runway heading. If they land early you get a time penalty. Don’t come to a complete stop on heading, or violate any other safety rules and they are disqualified. What makes it so exciting is that often the first plane back to the finish line isn’t the winner, because it takes them too long to get stopped. The races featured, Beavers, Cubs (of all sorts), Huskies, Kitfoxes, T-Crafts, RV, SuperSTOL, Cessna 170/182/180/185/206, Fly-Baby, Carbon Cubs, Highlanders, Wilga, a Tri-Pacer, Bushhawk, Bearhawk and others. The racing is truly is a crowd favorite and really fun. I raced a Yamaha powered Highlander flown by the eventual Champion, Steve Henry, out of Idaho. The Highlander not only takes off and lands in shorter distance than my 170, it always is faster, so unless Steve made a mistake, he was going to win. Steve doesn’t make many mistakes in his airplane. He beat me by 10 secs, but I was pleased with how I flew. Next year! The championship race was a thriller between Steve and the World Famous Bobby Breeden from Alaska flying a borrowed Carbon Cub. The CC got back and landed first, but Steve out broke him and came to a stop approx. 1 sec earlier.
Next came the traditional STOL completion. It was ran more of a demonstration than a true competition, because of the limited number or competitors in relation to the normal performance categories. They ran a Light Sport Class with Carbon Cubs/Rans/Highlander/Cubs and a Touring Class with my C-170, a C-180, a C-185 and a Maule M-7. Due to the dry conditions the takeoffs were kicking up too much dust to be seen and judged, so it turned into a STOL landing contest. In the end it really came down to Bobby and Steve. Bobby put down two consecutive 99-foot landings to take first place. Not bad for a calm day at over 7000’ density altitude! All four competitors in the heavy class were pretty close posting landings between 260 and 300’. The winning score ended up being 257’ flown by the C-170.
Up to this point it had been a wonderful day of fun, exciting flying but people were hot, tired and dusty! It was time for a few hours to relax before dinner. The aromas from the catering company’s efforts were drifting over the playa as people socialized getting to know new friends. A great dinner was enjoyed by over 400 people as the campfire continued to grow. The temps were once again dropping rapidly as the crowd settle in to have some fun with the drawings and gifts so generously donated to the High Sierra Fly-In by Air Frames AK, Catto, STOL Magazine, Garmin, Points North Heli-Ski, EarthX, Valdez STOL Fly-In, Backcountry Supercubs, Wild West Aerosports and Supercubs.Org. Without their great support this wonderful aviation event wouldn’t be possible. The guest speaker than shared an inspring, entertaining and educational presentation about surviving a supersonic ejection from an F-15 fighter jet. The wonderful evening was capped off with a fireworks display that would put many public displays to shame!
Photo by Darin Scheer
Sunday morning was the warmest yet at 27 degrees and frost free! The lakebed was abuzz with activity as crews tore down their camps and loaded their planes. The first airplane, a Luscombe, was airborne just after sunrise. With our camp torn down and packed into the bird we wandered over for our last meal with friends and helped toss the very last of the firewood on the blaze. The forecast was calling for strong tailwinds the entire way home for us, so with excitement we said our goodbyes, looked over the plane one last time and climbed in. We joined the slow but steady departure of planes and turned north towards home. HSF 2016 you rocked! See you next year.
