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| Fall Equinox
Breakfast Fly-Out |
| Dana Brejakova, Contributing Writer & Photographer |
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Breakfast fly-outs are always a great way to start our Saturday or Sunday. And just like
that, it happened again (after a long break) when we spontaneously flew out and caught
up with our fellow aviators while munching on scrambled eggs, hash browns, bacon,
pancakes, veggie omelets, eggs benedict, what have you. I really have to pinch myself
again to remind me this life is not just a dream. Never before I would have imagined
that one day I would be introduced to the world where one could fly out for breakfast
just like that and call it a habit.
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| Leaving the runway markings behind
and with the mighty mountain on the horizon we took off. |
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| It was a beautiful crisp morning
and cool temperatures allowed for a smooth flight. |
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Hurray! No heat convection bumps! Mind you, the summers in West Texas are pretty brutal
and if you want to go flying you have to be wheels-up and back in the early morning
hours, otherwise, brace yourselves for some headbanging turbulence. Luckily for us, the
temperature was pleasant and we had a fantastic flight for the fall equinox day.
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I was happy I could take pictures
of the morning when suddenly it hit me.
My gosh, it is fall, y'all. Another summer is
gone for good. |
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| Stars and bars above the hills and
mountains looked dashing and we were about to enter the pattern for landing. Breakfast, yum,
yum, yum! I was already pretty hungry. |
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| Captain Jimmy the Squirrel behind
the controls sporting that "pilot's back of the head" shot. This would be the back seater's
usual view of the cockpit. Unless the back seater can extend their neck, like I can, which
allows for eyeing the screens on the control panel. |
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| Colorful squadron of two RV-8s, one
RV-7, and one Mooney arrived. We tied the birds down and were on our way to the breakfast
joint. |
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After we enjoyed our breakfast and discussed everything aviation while sharing laughs and
pains of everyday life, we decided to head back to our birds and fly home.
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| Our wingman with his wife on the
back seat getting ready for take-off. |
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| On the way back home, we decided to
divert from the original flight plan and tried some S maneuvers along the river. Left turn,
right turn, left turn, right turn, while elegantly sailing through the air leaving the river
behind. |
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| Still no heat convection bumps and
we were having a blast. It is flying like this when one becomes alive. We were only three
noisy dots in the sky following the river. No one to witness us, maybe only a few birds
camping on the river wondering what the heck was going on. |
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| Weeeeeeee! Who here loves the
Never-Ending Story and the Falcor flight scene? I do and I am lucky and blessed enough to
experience it too! |
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| A bird's perspective of birds that
were trying to get airborne but then ended up landing on the water. When we reached the
beaches of the near-by lake, we decided to turn around and fly home since it was getting
warmer. |
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The rising temperature started to worry me a little because if the turbulent air was
shaking us, my photoshoot session would be over. Oh well, it is what it is when suddenly
BUMP! Uuugghhh, here we go. The heat convection bumps found us. I stowed my camera away
because I knew taking pictures was pointless from then on. Let's just enjoy the rises
and falls that thermals prepared for us and hope we do not get our butts kicked too
much. As we were bobbing along, Jimmy decided to top off the tanks for our up-coming
trip and why not enjoy a very good price for AVGAS at the spot that was right in our
flight path.
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| A million-dollar view right here!
4.99 for AVGAS, folks. |
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That would be full tanks, please! I am sure now you want to know where this magical place
is, right? Well, I can tell you since I was given permission to do so. This delightfully
priced juice for your thirsty bird can be found at the self-serve pump owned by Frost
Aviation Services located in Las Cruces airport in New Mexico. So put that KLRU
identifier in your systems and stop by.
As we positioned the bird closer to the tanks, I jumped out to try out my latest aviation
accessory.
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| Time to fashion and test my latest
aviation pendant! |
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The white tooth on the chain with the dog tag is a 3-D printed tooth (as I like to call
it) to elegantly open the gas tanks without scratching anything. I love that little
gadget. It is very helpful, sturdy yet gentle, and looks good too. However, I want to
give a shout out to the dog tag as well because the story behind it is very cool.
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| Check this out. This is the
original machine from WWI that was used to emboss dog tags for soldiers. And this same
machine was put in operation to emboss my dog tag just as well! Yay! And just how is that
possible, you may ask? |
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Well, every year, you can find this machine at FlyMart at EAA AirVenture Oshkosh and have
your dog tag embossed with anything you would like. When I saw that place and talked to
the guy who was utilizing the machine, I just had to have two of those made. One for our
RV-8 and second one for our Aviat Husky. I simply had mine and Jimmy's name embossed
together with N-number and type of the aircraft. Behold! A very cool aviation pendant
that not only looks great but it also means a lot to me.
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Tanks were topped and we were ready to finish our last leg home. Our Fall Equinox morning
could not have been better.
Until the next one!
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By Dana Brejakova, Contributing Writer & Photographer
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