My first and last flying road trip

Pilots tend to be optimists and seem to lead a richer fantasy life than most.  Given the significant time, money and ego investment needed to get a license, maybe these are even a necessity. For example, how many pilots have at some point fantasized that one day they might be called to the cockpit in an emergency?  (Fess up now.)  When I flew in small commuters, the guys behind the curtain didn’t have much better credentials than me, so this wasn’t totally ludicrous.  Of course it never happened, but a pleasant conceit anyway. With armored cockpits and big jets, this isn’t even a viable daydream. What is more likely is a call for a medical or mental health professional, or perhaps someone with zip tie handcuffs. Some dreams are more realistic: the flying road trip, for example, for pleasure and with a flexible agenda. The first one I did was some time ago now—New England in the fall.

As it happened, my pilot brother-in-law, Chaz, thought this was a fine idea too. The plan was for a mid-October trip from Virginia up the coast to northern Maine with a first stopover in Newport, Rhode Island and then Nantucket, Massachusetts. We would complete the remainder of the planning day by day. Getting to the adventure involved passing by Washington D.C., Baltimore, Maryland and the busy airspace around Newark, Kennedy, and La Guardia Airports. The weather looked excellent for flying—cool and clear. The trees would be changing too, getting more colorful as we went north. Since it was after Labor Day, we didn’t expect any problems finding places to stay, as many loding options would still be open for the season with no reservations required.

The day we began our flying road trip was severe clear so we flew under VFR just inside the coast of Maryland and Delaware to avoid major airport traffic until we unavoidably reached the New York area. Even just passing through, the views are magnificent at 2,500 feet AGL running up the coast in the fall. This is a perspective that you just can’t get in a car and is one of the great pleasures of general aviation—you get to look out the window a lot and see the world in a new light.

Weather was severe clear so we were able to fly VFR for most of our road trip.

Leaving Delaware, we flew over Delaware Bay to Cape May, New Jersey. The water to the left as we crossed leads to the Delaware River and various seaports along the river. To our right was the Atlantic Ocean and the next land was England or Africa. The bay was full of ships heading to and from the port of Philadelphia, and there were sailboats, pleasure and fishing boats especially close to the shore. We had a fantastic view of Cape May, Atlantic City and the New Jersey coast bound for a fuel stop in Toms River, New Jersey (MJX). We needed a pit stop for fuel and three other GA-type pilot things too:  bathroom, Diet Coke, and a pack of those orange peanut butter crackers always available at FBOs. Sometimes you can get free popcorn and coffee, but no joy that day.

The next leg was to our first stopover, Newport, Rhode Island. This leg passed through the most crowded airspace on the east coast, passing east of New York’s three major airports. This was a heady experience flying among the big boys. We used flight following which added to the big airport experience and were privy to all the radio traffic. We passed from controller to controller, getting new frequencies and headings. We never missed a call which was good because making a radio call was near impossible. We were across Long Island Sound and well into Connecticut when we were cut loose. We then headed direct for Newport.

After landing at Newport State (UUU), we tied down and took a taxi to town. We enjoyed a nice dinner and stay in a B&B recommended by the FBO. So far so good on the keeping it flexible thing. During dinner we planned our stayover flight to Nantucket, about a 55 NM flight mostly over water.

Dressed for overwater flight.

Flying over water requires some precautions.  Per flying club rules, we filed IFR and put on life vests for the trip. Cruise altitude was chosen to allow gliding to Martha’s Vineyard, the mainland, or our destination if necessary.  The photo shows what the well-equipped flyer wears for over water journeys. Nantucket history is interesting. It was a major whaling port in colonial days and it still has a significant nautical flavor with a lot of sail and powerboats in the harbor and a historic downtown. The island is small enough to walk or bike most places, and most of the day visitors remain in town. People sail or take the ferry to the island if you like that sort of thing, but there is a nice general aviation airport (ACK), which was just the thing for us. We decided to stay two days. While Nantucket has commuter airline service, and a lot of business jet activity, there were enough flyers like us that we didn’t feel out of place.

Neither of us had been to Nantucket before so we did a bit of walking around in the harbor and shopping areas. There are a lot of good restaurants, stores, and our bed and breakfast proved satisfactory. An intense storm came through on the second day we were there. I was a little worried about all the wind and rain, so I took a taxi to the airport to make sure the aircraft was still tied down well. Later in the day when the weather got a bit better, we checked out some of the more remote parts of the island. Among other things, we went to the beach. That evening we had another fine meal and made plans for Portland, Maine as the next major stop. Charlie suggested we stop in Northampton to see some friends. And why not, we are on a road trip after all, free to be flexible.

A stormy day on Nantucket.

We set out from Nantucket late morning after a fine breakfast and a last look around. The plan was to fly to Portland (PWM) and spend some time in the city, with just a short intermediate stop in Northampton.  Northampton Airport (7B2) was sort of on the way anyway.  We were picked up, had a leisurely lunch, pleasant conversation, and were dropped back at the airport and left for Portland. This is when the first hint of complication in a flying road trip first emerged: the stopover was longer than anticipated.

We overnighted in Portland but didn’t get to spend as much time seeing the city as we had hoped on arrival day. Portland is a nice accessible city with a lot of nautical history, but we were eager to push as far north as we could during the days left for our trip. Our time on the road was fixed even if the details were not. The next planned stop was Bar Harbor, Maine (BHB) for a lobster lunch. Among the pleasures of personal flying is just how much more you can see than from a car. The Maine coastal area is spectacular from the air.

Along our route was Knox County Airport (NKD). I remembered that Owls Head Transportation Museum was at the airport and with the road trip mentality in mind, we landed to see if we could check out the museum. Taxiing in, we asked the FBO on UNICOM the best way to get to the museum. His replied that we could taxi right up to their back door from the taxiway, and he gave us directions. We taxied to the back of the museum, parked, and walked right in. In retrospect, I decided that the FBO was having a bit of a joke on us and on the museum by suggesting the back door. The joke turned out to be on him since we were able to walk right in and have a great visit. The museum has a fabulous collection including cars, aircraft, horse drawn vehicles, bikes and motorcycles. We ended at the front desk where we paid our admission fee, walked out the back, got in the airplane, taxied out, and took off again. Onward to Bar Harbor.

The Owls Head Transportation Museum.

We landed at Hancock County/Bar Harbor Airport (NHB), right along the road to Bar Harbor. Ellsworth, Maine is not too far in the other direction. Bar Harbor is a very active summer resort area and gateway to Acadia National Park with hiking trails, ocean views, ponds, and rocks. Because of our spontaneous stopover, we only got to see any of this from the air. We decided that a lobster lunch was a feasible and perhaps the only alternative before we headed south again. Having bought fuel and consumed the free coffee, we apparently qualified to use the FBO crew car to get lunch. They gave us the keys and the code to the airport gate and were on our way to Ellsworth for lobster and chowder.

But taking advantage of flexibility has a cost as we now needed to make a quick trip back to Virginia. Our time was almost up. The extra time on Nantucket and two side trips had used up the slack time we had built into our schedule. The next stop was Winsdor Locks, Connecticut (Bradley International (BDL)).

While not gigantic, Bradley still counts as flying with the big boys. Since we filed IFR, we were automatically fed into the large airport traffic area and sequenced for landing. There are some complications when your top speed is a little slower than the landing speed of the big boys. We were sequenced into the landing pattern between two commercial flights. About halfway through our approach, the controller asked us to do a left 360 turn, e.g. delay 2 minutes, thus switching place with the big jet behind us. A few minutes later we were on the ground at the general aviation FBO. We took advantage of another pilot thing—a crew rate at a local hotel. They picked us up and dropped us off at the airport the next morning, just like the corporate pilots. White shirts with shoulder boards would have helped with the illusion but proved unnecessary. Out of time, the next day was a dash back home using an almost direct inland route, with only a quick fuel stop.

This was a great trip, but my first and last flying road trip. Subsequent trips were well planned with reservations made and realistic timing. The good outcome this time was due to specific preconditions. A big one was our choice of season when we could be pretty sure of finding places to visit and stay without advanced reservations. Another was that my flying club only charged for two hours flying time per day and was willing to lose use of the aircraft for more than a week. FBOs cannot generally accommodate this.

It is not that the flying road trip concept is bad, it is that having a fixed timeline for the aircraft and people makes it hard. Unlike driving, you can’t stop at any old place along the route. Using your own aircraft might be a different story. Now retired, time isn’t so much a factor. I wonder how hard it would be to build a suitable aircraft. I have a three-car garage, time on my hands, and already many of the tools I would need. More tools? Not be a problem, always happy to have new tools. Maybe I’ll start with just one piece, say an aileron, just to check things out. Apparently pilot fantasy life doesn’t die easily.

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Randall Shumaker

Randy soloed at 17, earned his private license at 18, with new ratings over the years as time, opportunity, and finances allowed, adding first Instrument then Commercial and multi-engine. He enjoyed flying for both business and pleasure including some exciting cross-country adventures. His early engineering career involved test and evaluation of the gear needed for operating aircraft from ships. Since retirement he serves as a docent in a warbird museum where many of the Navy aircraft types that he worked with are now primarily of historical interest. He still looks up whenever he hears an airplane overhead.

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