The morning finally arrived, cool for mid July in Kentucky with low humidity. A truly rare and wonderful day for a flyin. I took off from my strip about 7:30 to fly over to Paul Huber's and pickup Paula for the flight to Lee's Airpark (Leland Stevenson's) for the BUG flyin. I was great by clear skies and low lying fog in the Kentucky River Basin. I landed at Paul's, but he was nowhere to be found, his hangar door was open and his trike was gone so I knew he was out flying. I gave him a couple of hails on the radio, but nothing. Paula had arrived and we were preparing for the 75 mile flight to Leland's. |
Ah, in the distance I spotted a familiar silhouette. There was Paul in his AC Clipper. He was not flying his trike to Leland's with us, but flying down in Dan Stiles' Cessna. Paula and I were planning on staying overnight, but Paul had to be back this afternoon. |
Paul decided to fly part of the way with us as Dan was not due for awhile, and he could raise us on the radio. Paul and I generally use 122.750 for our air communications. We are following the general course of the Kentucky River for this part of the journey. It was really striking with the fog. |
Paul flew about 15 miles with us and then turned and headed back to Seldom Scene, his airfield. |
There were several planes and campers already there when we landed. Setting up and preparing for the aerial onslaught! |
Dan (on the right) and Paul made it to the flyin even though they were in a GA aircraft. Dan's 150. |
Saturday afternoon Kenny Downard (The little dot at the end of my wing is his Clip Wing Challenger.) Paula and I decided to fly to Dale Hollow Lake. In this image you can see part of Lake Cumberland. Leland's strip is right on the Lake, and you can see the lake immediately upon take off. |
Here is an image of Dale Hollow Lake. |
This is an image of Willow Grove Resort and Marina. We keep our boat, the Dan-Dee Diver here. Paula and I are also avid SCUBA divers and certified divemasters. |
This is an image of Petro Field near Albany, Kentucky. It is right on Dale Hollow Lake. They have private homes with hangars here, a motel and resort called Spring Creek after Spring Creek, one of the tributaries of Dale Hollow Lake. Dale Hollow Lake is considerably smaller than Lake Cumberland. Lake Cumberland is 53,000 surfaces acres with an average depth of 96 feet! Dale Hollow covers 27,000 surface acres with an average depth of 60 feet. |
This is Kenny in his Challenger off our starboard wing on the way back to Leland's from Dale Hollow Lake. |
Lee's Airpark from the southeast at 2500'. |
We landed at Leland's visited, had dinner, and then settled in for the night. Paula and I opted for the comfort of a nearby motel while Kenny brought his tent and bedroll. |
5 AM arrived too early, but thanks to our invaluable chauffeurs,Cindy and Irene who wouldn't even let us buy them breakfast, we were in the air by 7:30 after fueling and a thorough preflight. We were greeted by this wonderfully shrouded vista of Lake Cumberland. We were tired, but the flight home was beautiful, the air was perfect, the temperature just right and the sky clear. We flew a total of 351 miles in 6.5 hours for the weekend. As soon as I landed and we put the trike in the toy shed we took a nap! What a great time we had, thank you very much everyone, especially Leland and his family, Barry, and Cindy. |
