Launching
The day seemed to be starting slow but once we could see the inversion breaking in the valley we started hucking. A quick hunt out front and I was off to 12,000 ft pretty rapidly.
I headed northwest in hopes of getting another climb at the big mountain above Jerome. No dice but still had a bunch of altitude so I kept going onto the foothills near Perkinsville, a remote crossing of the Verde river in the middle of nowwhere. I radioed my plans to BJ and hoped for the valley to be hot enough to give'er.
I headed to a ridge that seemed to have a few things going for it and got my second climb and back up to 9000 ft. A few miles later another climb to above 10,000 had me relaxing a bit as the terrain isn't all that friendly out there for landing any type of aircraft. Highway 89 became my next goal. It connects Prescott to I-40 and runs north/south. Another climb got me near 11,000 and I had the pavement on glide but I didn't plan on stopping there. Meanwhile BJ had chose to land and gracefully decided to chase me.
Once I linked up with the highway BJ was navigating the 20 miles of terrian I had flown over. Which is more like 50 miles of, well not the easiest dirt roads to travel over. I looked back trying to see him but no luck. A couple low saves as the miles went by and I was on my way to Ashfork. As I approached Ashfork BJ radioed that he was on the highway. I hope I thanked him enough for the beating he gave his truck. As I approached Ashfork I got to my highest altitude of the flight, 12,888. As luck would have it I ran into headwind just south of the town so I headed west.
As I flew west toward Seligman I got my last climb back up to 12,200 before I went on my last glide out Rt. 66. BJ had caught up to me and had site of me for the first time in about 3 hours. I set it down next to the mother road for high fives and cold beer. Huge thanks to BJ!!!!!!! Not only did he come get me we retraced the trip back to the top of Mingus to get my truck. I think he drove well over 200 miles for me. I think I owe him one. My friend Dustin flew as well. He had launced before me and took a different route to the southwest. I beleive he flew near 44 miles and landed near Peeples Valley, AZ. Nice flight D!
Until next time!
T
