June Flyout

June’s flyout was to Tacoma Narrows, and the weather was beautiful. Eleven folks showed up for a noontime lunch at The Hub restaurant. We had pilots from all over, with the long distance award going to Madeline Patterson. Madeline was in town from Grand Forks, ND. She gave notice she’d like to join the flyout group and John Ward graciously gave her a ride from Port Angeles in his Pipistrel Sinus. This light sport aircraft has a wingspan of nearly 50 feet and cruises a bit over 100 mph at around 3 gallons per hour. Specs indicate that had Madeline had one, she could have flown it from Grand Forks to our luncheon with one fuel stop…

Other aircraft that flew in for our event included a Wag Aero J-3 look alike (Jay Pearlman), Glastar (Ray and Lisa Ballantyne), Piper Pacer (Harry Cook), Piper Cherokee 180 (Gordon Tubsing with Brendan Carmody), RV-10 (Tim Alentiev), and Saffire (Barry and Tracy Halsted). I was particularly pleased when Tacoma Tower asked me when I was about 3 miles away if Saffire was a jet!

The Hub sits just north of the tower at Tacoma Narrows and there was plenty of room to park. An advance call assured that we all shared a single table and lunch included good food plus lots of talk. I am fortunate to hear comments from our flyout attendees and the one I hear most is that the socialization is really fun. We generally sit together and chat about all kinds of things.

We all had fun – and more great flyouts are ahead this year. The next two (July and August) will help qualify those participating in our annual Poker Run.

Barry