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This was going to be the latest in a no-doubt seemingly-interminable series of aeroplane posts, but our destination this weekend is the one part of Western Australia that gets reliably lousy weather, even in the summer: the southern coast. In that regard, this weekend was predictably disappointing. In almost every other regard, it was an excellent diversion.

The conditions were fine for an IFR arrival, but my American instrument rating can’t be applied to my 3-month licence validation, probably with good reason — I imagine that IFR flying in Australia is more like far northern Canada than the US, in the sense that radar coverage is virtually nonexistent.

As you plan your Denmark holiday, keep in mind that searching for information about this 2,500-person town, whose nearest major town is Albany, is predictably difficult. These destinations are not the typical results for those search keywords.

Along the way and in Denmark itself are fabulous wine country, for which accommodations must be made. Just as in the Barossa Valley, it is the little wineries nobody’s heard of that occupy both ends of the spectrum. Some are a bit of a disaster, but others are a delight.

The last winery we had time for was Mariners Rest Wines, whose somewhat campy nautical theme was eventually revealed to have a more tasteful origin: the winery is owned and run by an ex-Naval officer and his wife.

The first round of tastings were nothing to write home about, and indeed we may not have stayed if we hadn’t been unceremoniously marshaled out to the rear porch for cheese and bikkies, whereupon we discover a veritable grove of tangelo, walnut, and avocado trees.

We sat outside and talked to the owner-wife for a while, who was crazy as a bat, but very nice. She periodically darted into the main room to gather samples of their other offerings — a couple of which were in fact quite good — giving us time to offer hypotheses regarding what the poor people might be getting on to at that stage of the afternoon.

Regular listeners will have already made the mental leap to the end of the story, in which my arms are laden, overflowing like some kind of vegetarian Scrooge McDuck, with avocados in various stages of ripening. I ate a ripe one with supper that night, another on bread for lunch the next day, and they were the most perfect and delicious butter ever to come off a tree, blemished in none of the ways that avocados trucked two thousand miles from the source tend to be. All store-bought avocados of the past and future will be judged against these, and inevitably fall short.

Do not be fooled by his aesthetically pleasing yellow bucket: those waters are antarctic, from the glacial oceans of the deepest south, unfit for man nor beast.

Which is a shame, because Green’s Pool is very effectively sheltered from the raging ocean by a series of boulders 50-100m out to sea. If only it were warm.

These are the famous Elephants’ Asses Rocks, which the local tourism bureau is very pleased about.

On our way out of Denmark, we detoured to nature’s own Treetop Walk, a literally more pedestrian and accessible version of what was to follow (and what has come before). Although it’s somewhat lacking in adrenaline when compared to its sister sites, it is every bit as shockingly beautiful to be up in the canopy.

The gigantic poles that hold up the structure are made from a particular steel blend that’s designed to rust superficially, to complement the environment as much as possible. This is not one of those poles. This is one of those poles.

(complete photoset)

The return journey is nothing if not long, but there was another tree-related attraction located conveniently near the midpoint of our travels.

It’s called The Dave Evans Bicentennial Tree, but there is no explanatory material of any kind, so I’m going to assume it’s dedicated to the original 1973-74 lead singer from iconic Sydney band AC/DC.

This is not to be confused with the Gloucester Tree, but you would be forgiven for doing so. They are both in Pemberton, and internationally tall.

The internet cannot even begin to get its story straight about how tall the Gloucester and Bicentennial trees are, but the preponderance of the evidence seems to suggest that, at any rate, the Bicentennial tree is taller. The top platform may or may not be at a height of 72 meters.

Unlike the Gloucester Tree, there is a little platform about 20 meters up, where you are advised not to proceed further if you’re pregnant, have a heart condition, or are not at least this tall.

Please enjoy the aforementioned instrument conditions.

We wonder if anyone has ever fallen to their death. It seems hard to imagine that it’s never happened, but the internet turns up no relevant facts.

(complete photoset)

I’ve been in Perth for twelve weeks now, but so busy that I haven’t left the city at all.

There is plenty to see and do in Western Australia, but those sights are almost all very far apart from one another. Enter the light aeroplane.

It was a busy day at Hyden airport.

INVISIBLE AIRPORT

You don’t get the reference, and that’s fine; it doesn’t make you a bad person.

It’s hard to believe after the flying of last summer, but I’m pretty sure that Wave Rock is the first time I’ve operated on an unsealed runway. It’s extremely well-maintained, the kind of nice, flat runway that is probably almost effortless in a climate that never experiences frozen water.

I think it gets a daily commercial flight from someplace, probably Perth, so at 1000m long it’s about three times as much runway as I need. Not that I’m complaining.

the walk from the airport is through a dead, barren wasteland

I live in the desert that is Perth, I spent a few days last summer in the eastern deserts, but this is the most desolate place I’ve ever been. It looks like the bush was torched and then salted, lest anything ever grow again, which is probably not as far from the truth as it sounds. Farmers are constantly fighting a war on salinity.

It’s almost all you could see in any direction, except for the road back to the airport, and it radiated death.

the famous wave rock, object of my visitation

There are many internet web home page sites that will tell you all about the rock itself, the algae that adorns it, and the catchment area of which it forms a part.

I will tell you that it is very tall, about 15m, and a pretty interesting rock. There are a lot of details, for someone with enough forethought to bring a macro lens. But I really preferred the climbing around on top part.

The aeroplane is a tiny speck.

February in the Australian desert is very hot

Please let there be no misunderstandings, false impressions, misconceptions, or misapprehensions. It was 38 earth degrees in the shade, of which there is none.

I had a short delay clearing security on my way out.

Would I drive four hours in a car, each way, to see Wave Rock? Probably not. Maybe once. Almost certainly not twice.

But 90 minutes each way was a pleasant journey (its own reward, it is said, and rarely truer than in the aeroplane) and an interesting destination. It has the important benefit of the airstrip being 500m from the main attraction.

(Complete photoset)

sea urchin fish

short-tail stingray fish

starfish fish

yellow striped fish

silver fish

(complete set)

Today is not an ideal day for flying, as such, but it’s ideal for someone with an instrument rating. It’s marginal VFR in the western part of our route, and very low IFR in the east, which is expected to continue through our arrival.

It turns out, however, that 7,000 feet was the perfect altitude to file, because for the first two hours we were VFR between cloud layers. blizzard would have really loved this part of the flight, enjoying flying above flat cloud tops as he does.

The last hour and a half to Albany was solid instrument conditions, although the clouds were very thin — we could still see the wingtips perfectly — and the air was very smooth. We broke out at some point during the initial descent, and made a visual approach into Albany.

Word to the wise: Albany has a good self-serve fuel price, but their pumps are a pain in the ass to find at night. They’re surrounded with construction-flasher barricades that make the area look off-limits; the flashers are almost tall enough to scrape low wings, with no room to taxi clear of them; and the area is completely unlit, so bring a flashlight (which you should have anyway, tsk tsk) and try not to lose your keys.

The rest of the trip was marginal VFR, and none of the 500-1,000 foot ceilings stuck around for our arrival, which is fine. 500 feet is well above ILS minima, but I’d rather get my practice without a passenger.

It’s nice to be home, and the 30-40 knot tailwinds certainly helped, but I’m ready for bed.

Before we begin: for anyone hoping to buy aeronautical charts at the Toronto Island airport, forget it. You can maybe get a local Canadian chart from Island Air, but nobody has American charts, not even for the airspace that begins less than 30 miles from Toronto. Assclownery.

One public service announcement: mothers already nervous about general aviation may wish to skip the final anecdote about landing at Medina.

Flying from the United States to Canada is pretty easy. You have your paperwork in order, you give at least two hours’ notice, and you arrive plus-or-minus 30 minutes of your ETA. If nobody’s there to meet you when you land, you call again, and they clear you over the phone. Done and done.

Flying the other direction is stressful. You fax a form (honestly, who even has a fax machine any more?), give them at least an hour’s notice (up to 24 hours’ notice for some airports), and arrive within 0 minutes before and 15 minutes after your stated ETA.

Think about that; more often than not, even the airlines can’t hit a 15-minute window in their schedules. Fortunately, if there’s some big change to your plans, or the winds, or your ATC routing, or the weather, or any of a million other variables, you can usually get the word to customs via Flight Services.

Today we cleared customs at Burke Lakefront Airport in Cleveland, and to make it yet more stressful, they only provide customs services until 14:00. The very earliest our schedule will allow us to arrive is 13:30, so the window for delays is narrow, with serious consequences if we miss.

The first customs woman I spoke to was a delight. She was cheerful and bubbly and talkative and extremely helpful.

The supervisor who called back was all business, with zero charm. She also said — I am not making this up — that due to heightened awareness, we can only offer customs services at Burke until 14:00.

Heightened awareness is apparently the reason. Heightened awareness.

Anyway, KBKL is a really nice airport! It’s on prime lakefront real estate, so of course people are clamouring to develop it, but fortunately it seems to be pretty heavily used by business and other GA traffic. It’s also basically right downtown. With any luck, it’s probably here to stay.

After dropping Jacob and clearing customs, my final leg was a short one to Medina.

I could have gone VFR, but the weather was marginal, and I’m not familiar with this airspace (though presumably someone at this airport could have sold me a VFR chart). It would have been a hell of a lot faster, it turns out.

Getting from Burke to Medina should have been a 20-minute direct flight, but instead I got vectored from hell to breakfast, presumably to keep me away from the Cleveland Hopkins approach traffic, and it took about an hour. It’s 24 nm point-to-point; my flight was 79.

Getting into Medina was fairly tricky. The airport unicom advised that the winds were variable, favouring runway 19, 20 knots gusting to 30. When I arrived on the final approach leg, it was exactly as advertised.

The wind socks were swinging around — usually pointing straight down the runway, but occasionally 30 degrees to either side.

Not only that, but the two wind socks on different parts of the field were getting different effects from the surrounding trees, and were usually pointing in totally different directions. (!)

The first approach went pretty well until I was over the threshold at about 30 feet, when the wind shifted and pushed me off to the right.

Go around.

The second approach was easier. Still gusty, but I got lucky and the winds stayed straight down the runway long enough to get the wheels down.

My dad was watching from the deck of the FBO and I think it made him nervous, but he approved of the landing. I’m glad my mother was not around to witness it; she doesn’t need that kind of stress.

Medina Airport used to be called Freedom Field. I thought they renamed it after 9/11 because they were embarrassed about everything else in the country being renamed Freedom This or Freedom That, but it turns out it was renamed when Medina County bought the airport in 1987.

It is also a nice little airport! Two perpendicular paved runways, one of which I hear is being extended to handle bizjets. I believe they’re getting FAA airport improvement funds, which basically guarantees that the airport land won’t be sold off to developers. Decently-priced fuel, a nice guy manning the FBO, and it’s 3 miles from our cabin.

If you need a place to park in northeast Ohio, I recommend it highly.

chez shona’s parents is lovely indeed, with delightful amenities — but the bed, oh how it squeaks.

This bed squeaked at the slighest motion. I woke up about 4:00 to hear it quietly squeaking — I am not making this up — from the slight motion caused by my heart beating.

When I awoke proper, I discovered that I was locked in, because the doorknob just spun around its shaft. I took the door off the hinges — no screwdriver required, fortunately — enjoyed a shower, and then forgot my robot toothbrush in their bathroom.

Jacob and I continued our planned flight to Toronto under much better conditions. It’s a VFR day, but flying IFR makes for a much easier border crossing, and a much easier time in unfamiliar airspace.

The approach into Toronto City Airport runway 26 is incredible. Fly straight towards downtown, then hang a left onto short final, with the skyscrapers and CN Tower off your right wingtip for landing.

photo credit: jacob

Customs cleared us by telephone — huzzah — and we got to take the idiot ferry across 100 meters of water over which the city refuses to permit the building of a bridge.

beltzner — incomparable gentleman that he is — picked us up at the ferry and took us to his unreasonably nice home.

The place we had lunch had a banner up, along the lines of “YES! WE ACCEPT US DOLLARS AT PAR!“, a sign that manages to be simultaneously awesome and nauseating. We assumed that he’d had it in the basement for 30 years, and couldn’t wait to dig it out this week.

Dinner was arranged at the superb Avli which, in spite of its fixed-in-metal grammatical folly, serves excellent Greek food.

After a post-dinner gathering at shaver’s (freshly painted and looking great for baby) some of us took in a selection of late-night nuit blanche events.

I was not around for last year’s, but beltzner’s opinion is that this year’s offerings were generally inferior, which is believable. Most of what I saw did not inspire, but the highlight, to be sure, was a professional dance troupe’s staging of Thriller in the distillery district.

They’re trying to break the record — I am told that there are records for this kind of thing — for the largest group dance (of Thriller, natch) on October 27 and 28. Awesome?

Jacob and I are headed to Toronto today (dropping Chris in Syracuse), and of course yesterday and today are the only two days in weeks that aren’t perfect for flying.

We checked in with Flight Services a couple times to get updates on a line of thunderstorms moving east over Syracuse. It was a big line, way too big to fly around, but there was a pretty big hole between cells along our route.

Unfortunately, getting Flight Services to describe them to you just doesn’t cut it. With no weather radar in the plane, and with virtually no weather radar on ATC’s scopes, we can’t have confidence that we can avoid the cells.

At the last moment before we re-penetrate the clouds and can no longer see the thunderheads with our own eyes, we do a U-turn and divert to the airport right below us, Johnstown, NY.

Johnstown/Fulton County turns out to be a very nice small airport, almost ideal for spending the afternoon. Valley View Aviation let us crash in their lounge, use their computer for weather updates, order pizza, and generally make ourselves at home. Two hours past their normal closing time, in fact.

Line after line of thunderstorms kept coming off the lake, with just barely too little space between them for us to make a dash. After four or five boring hours the sun went down, which made the weather clear up almost immediately, and we got into Syracuse around 21:00.

Toronto City tower closes at 22:00, so we accepted an invitation to the lovely chez shona’s parents, and will head out early tomorrow.

Definitely ready for sleeping.

I finally got around to finishing the writeup of my Australian adventure.

If you haven’t been keeping up — perhaps because, like me, your crappy RSS reader doesn’t show backdated posts — this is your moment.

SIR–

Our communication must remain brief, as this customer has already lost the feeling in his fingers and toes.

Your northeast corridor trains offer unmatched convenience at an affordable price, but the arctic blasts with which they are equipped do not please this correspondent.

Heavy coats and mountaineering undergarments oughtn’t be required upon boarding your vessel in any season; that you additionally disregard your passengers’ summertime apparel displays a contempt for comfort that has become unfortunately common in most modern American transportation.

P I Schwan
Cambridge, Massachusetts

The new Air Canada section of Logan’s terminal B is terrible (jacob tells me it’s the former Delta space –ed). Though seemingly recently renovated, it’s way, way too small to hold waiting passengers for five flights — and it’s no longer adjacent to the United lounge in terminal C.

I hate it. But it’s just one more thing for me not to like about flying Air Canada, really. The camel’s back was broken long ago.