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More of the same

I've been with my current employer for some time. One consequence is that I earn a significant amount of PTO every year. I have to make sure I use it because I can carry only so much over to the next year. So I occasionally do what I did this week, which is to take one or two days off and just do other stuff. Of course, "other stuff" includes flying if the weather's nice.

Yesterday the weather was lovely, so I headed out to the airport to exercise the plane. I didn't have any particular timetable or destination. I took my time with the preflight inspection and with putting gas in the tanks. Once I took off I made a trip around the pattern, then made an acceptable landing. The wind was a bit squirrely on the approach but I'm getting better at dealing with it.

I took off again and headed north. I flew inland from the cost a ways, then decided, what the heck, I'll head out to the San Juan Islands again. I ended up flying a course similar to the one I followed on my previous flight, only this time I decided to land at a couple of airports along the way for more practice.

I first landed at Friday Harbor. My landing there was decent, though not particularly pretty. I taxied back and took off again, then headed up to Orcas Island. I made a straight in approach this time, as other traffic was doing the same. My landing there was much better, one I was pretty proud of. Again, I taxied back and took off. I then headed east to the mainland, then south back to Harvey. The total flight was 2.3 hours, possibly my longest flight in Ariel so far.

Because I didn't have a particular route planned out this time, I was able to take my time and enjoy what I was doing. I used to do this sort of thing on my motorcycle; just head out somewhere and ride around, maybe stopping here or there for a bit to look at the view, or to have a bite. I've yet to have a so-called "hundred dollar hamburger" in that I haven't flown to another airport to visit a restaurant there, but I imagine that will happen at some point this summer.

I didn't take any pictures on this trip, because I already have pictures of the islands and I wanted just to enjoy flying the plane without any distractions. I did, however, take a picture of Ariel right before I wheeled her back into the hangar. Here she is looking very proud of herself after a lovely flight.



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