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- Oct 12, 2014
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As the title says, today was a very good day.
It's almost exactly a year (a year and two months, actually) since I rolled my Starduster into a ball during a forced landing in a field that turned out to be a swamp while attempting to fly to my cabin in upstate NY, crashing only a few minutes from my destination airport.
As I've related elsewhere, I bought a Hatz biplane a week ago. Today I made the same flight in the Hatz, but successfully this time. Still, I was nervous about it. Passing over the field/swamp where it happened, it was a good feeling to keep on going! As my wife was away, my son in law met me at the airport (Warwick, N72), then we flew over to Kobelt airport (N45) for a nice lunch before returning to Warwick to drive to the cabin. Kobelt is special to me as it's where I had my very first biplane ride back in the 1970s, and later got aerobatic instruction in their Stearmam that they rented for the princely sum of $50/hour.
Walking up the hill to the cabin past the stone barn where I briefly stored the wreck before hauling it home to Connecticut I was struck be how much better I was feeling than a year ago... I always love this time of year but last year at this time I was feeling pretty bleak.
Tomorrow I'll fly the Hatz up to Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome to meet up with my brother in law who's flying in from near Utica with some of his EAA buddies (the real reason for making the trip this particular weekend), then I'll fly back home after the show.
It's almost exactly a year (a year and two months, actually) since I rolled my Starduster into a ball during a forced landing in a field that turned out to be a swamp while attempting to fly to my cabin in upstate NY, crashing only a few minutes from my destination airport.
As I've related elsewhere, I bought a Hatz biplane a week ago. Today I made the same flight in the Hatz, but successfully this time. Still, I was nervous about it. Passing over the field/swamp where it happened, it was a good feeling to keep on going! As my wife was away, my son in law met me at the airport (Warwick, N72), then we flew over to Kobelt airport (N45) for a nice lunch before returning to Warwick to drive to the cabin. Kobelt is special to me as it's where I had my very first biplane ride back in the 1970s, and later got aerobatic instruction in their Stearmam that they rented for the princely sum of $50/hour.
Walking up the hill to the cabin past the stone barn where I briefly stored the wreck before hauling it home to Connecticut I was struck be how much better I was feeling than a year ago... I always love this time of year but last year at this time I was feeling pretty bleak.
Tomorrow I'll fly the Hatz up to Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome to meet up with my brother in law who's flying in from near Utica with some of his EAA buddies (the real reason for making the trip this particular weekend), then I'll fly back home after the show.
