- Joined
- Oct 12, 2014
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Yesterday was a good day. The night before I'd finished some minor repairs on my Hatz, and yesterday was an antique plane and car show at Bayport Aerodrome (23N) on Long Island, NY. 51 miles direct from my home base in CT, more like 75 miles the way I'd fly to minimize the over water portion to 10 miles and avoid airspace. Bayport is an anomaly in this day and age. It's the last publicly owned grass airstrip on Long Island, owned by and in the town of Islip (a city really), nestled in a tiny cutout with a 700' ceiling in the Long Island class C, only 3½ miles from MacArthur (ISP) and just outside of the NYC mode C veil.
My daughter went with me. There were clouds at 3000' which limited how high I could go when crossing Long Island Sound, but once across I dropped down to about 1500 to avoid the headwinds which were making our groundspeed as low as 47 knots. Bumpy, too, except over the water. Going into Bayport is interesting, they have published approach from the south ("cross the shore at the marina, follow the river, head toward the tanks, stay south of the highway", etc.). And yeah, it's a beautiful grass strip right in the middle of town.
And what an airport! It's just filled with neat airplanes, mostly biplanes. I didn't see a single boring airplane there, not a single nosedragger except for a couple of Ercoupes. Half a dozen Stearmans at least, two Bird biplanes, a couple of absolutely pristine Wacos, a Pitts, a Skybolt, a Hatz project (the builder was very happy to see mine), and an assortment of lightplanes, Cubs, Airknockers, tailwheel Cessnas, Luscombes, etc. And the car show, featuring Jaguar this year. And food, live music, just a great event. I didn't take more than a couple of pictures.
That's my Hatz in the background. It's one of the Birds next to the Cub, and of course the Stearmans. We stayed for a few hours, were invited to come back for their summer fly-in on August 18, and hit the road for home with a gas stop at Brookhaven which was calling 16 gusting to 25, 45° off either runway. My landing there was less than elegant and the takeoff was worse, but I didn't break anything.
Heading back, for once the winds didn't switch and we had a good tailwind, showing as high as 110 kts! The trip out took an hour and twenty minutes, the return only 45. Another rather sporty landing at home, and a beer from the hangar fridge while watching other people deal with the winds.
My daughter went with me. There were clouds at 3000' which limited how high I could go when crossing Long Island Sound, but once across I dropped down to about 1500 to avoid the headwinds which were making our groundspeed as low as 47 knots. Bumpy, too, except over the water. Going into Bayport is interesting, they have published approach from the south ("cross the shore at the marina, follow the river, head toward the tanks, stay south of the highway", etc.). And yeah, it's a beautiful grass strip right in the middle of town.
And what an airport! It's just filled with neat airplanes, mostly biplanes. I didn't see a single boring airplane there, not a single nosedragger except for a couple of Ercoupes. Half a dozen Stearmans at least, two Bird biplanes, a couple of absolutely pristine Wacos, a Pitts, a Skybolt, a Hatz project (the builder was very happy to see mine), and an assortment of lightplanes, Cubs, Airknockers, tailwheel Cessnas, Luscombes, etc. And the car show, featuring Jaguar this year. And food, live music, just a great event. I didn't take more than a couple of pictures.
That's my Hatz in the background. It's one of the Birds next to the Cub, and of course the Stearmans. We stayed for a few hours, were invited to come back for their summer fly-in on August 18, and hit the road for home with a gas stop at Brookhaven which was calling 16 gusting to 25, 45° off either runway. My landing there was less than elegant and the takeoff was worse, but I didn't break anything.
Heading back, for once the winds didn't switch and we had a good tailwind, showing as high as 110 kts! The trip out took an hour and twenty minutes, the return only 45. Another rather sporty landing at home, and a beer from the hangar fridge while watching other people deal with the winds.
