Saturday, May 30, 2009

We have a plane!!

We have the charts, we have matching T-shirts, we have most of the paperwork done, and most importantly - we have a plane!! N29SP has been through its overhaul and annual, and is back on the line once again. The mechanic would like us to put 20 hours on it in the next couple weeks, and to do an oil change before we go. Today Mary and I went up in it for the first time in weeks, taking with us Ethel Bailey, Ninety-Nine and champion CFI. It was a beautiful day, and I flew to York and Mary flew us back. Oil burn was minimal, and things look good. As it happens, I'm in the process of changing jobs and have some free time planned, so we aim to take the opportunity to fly as much as possible prior to leaving for Colorado. So far the run up to this year's race has been a very different experience to last year, as we have had much less opportunity for training flights in our race plane than Linda and I did in 2008. But Mary and I both raced in 2008, and have flown together often before, and N29SP is an easy plane to fly well, so we are feeling pretty good at this point.