Anyway, I also went back up on September 19th. I really wanted to do my solo cross country, but I didn't get endorsed by Jack, and he was off this weekend. But I was endorsed to fly solo at Eau Claire and Menomonie, so I decided to go flying and get some more solo confidence building done! I had to head into work anyway on Saturday morning, finally after that was done, go to the airport at 10:30. Getting myself off the ground seemed to take forever.... the FBO took the wrong plane out of the hangar, I did my preflight, oil was a bit high and discussed it with the airplane mechanic (no problem), mechanic took my oil wrag, went to find him to get it back, preflight done, about to fire up the plane, realized the FBO gave me the wrong clipboard and key, went back inside to get the right one, back in the plane, realized my pen on my clipboard was gone, back inside the FBO to borrow a pen, finally, I can get moving!
The weather wasn't exactly perfect for flying, but great for learning! Winds were manageable, varying between 6-8 knots, but at perfect crosswinds for every runway at both KEAU and KLUM. So, tower had me taxi to 22, off I went. Sheesh! I knew it had been about 2.5 weeks, but the takeoff was ugly, I compensated for the wind, but I seemed to struggle on the take off for the first few seconds. After I got it under control headed off to the west on a straight out departure. Did some rectangular courses, turns around a point, some slips. But something just didn't feel right, I felt this desire to be back on the ground for a while. The weather was a bit bouncy, and there was a lot of haze, and I think that is what made me a bit uncomfortable, but it was good experience! The last few dozen flights, was generally good weather. This was perfectly safe and legal flying conditions, just not perfect, and I needed that time to get comfortable flying in not-so-perfect conditions. The limited visibility from the haze made me feel uneasy, I usually can see Menomonie after taking off from Eau Claire, I couldn't this time, and couldn't make out the runway until I was about 6-8 miles out. Again, still good VMC conditions, and within the limitations of my endorsement, but I got myself a bit weirded out, it was getting more bouncy and I didn't like the clouds/haze I was seeing to the west. So, I started heading back to Eau Claire, dialed up the frequency and gave a listen. There was a bit of traffic, including a plane that just took off in my direction. So, then I got myself a little nervous about another plane in my neighborhood, so I decided to do some more rectangular courses, keeping an eye out for that plane. Finally, caught sight of him, he was a good 3 miles away, about 500 feet below me, and zooming westbound. I realized my maneuvers brought me much closer to Menomonie, the conditions looked better, so I decided do some touch and goes. It was a popular day for flying. Weather called for winds out of 150, making it an obvious choice for Runway 18, I enter the pattern, and I hear two planes working the pattern on Runway 9. What the? We had a few communications, and finally had a visual on the main plane in conflict, they were of no issue. So, I turn base, final and on the ground. I was a bit nervous for that landing, and it showed, landed a bit firm on the main gear, and missed the high speed turn off. No big deal, taxied off, was going to go back to Runway 18 to take off, but there was another plane still doing touch and goes on Runway 9, so I decided to join in the pattern for that runway to avoid any conflicts. After he took off, I waited, and got behind him and off I went. As I followed my fellow pilot in the pattern, I couldn't believe how long he waited to turn base, his final must have been 2-3 miles long easy, he was over Lake Menomin for Pete's Sake! But I wasn't going to cut him off, so I followed, did a touch and go, and did one more, and had enough, I didn't like his patterns so wide, so I exited to the east and returned to Eau Claire.
At Eau Claire, entered the pattern for a right base for runway 22. That is something I definitely need more work on. My right base turns are atrocious, which was caused primarily by me getting way to close to the runway on my downwind leg. I couldn't recover the approach, so called for the go around. The controller put me back into left traffic, which I am much better at. I proceeded to do another 6 or so touch and goes with varied traffic, a couple extended base legs because of incoming straight in traffic, and another go-around the controller called me to do. All the landings were in crosswind conditions, and the last 3 landings were much softer and I could actually feel myself land on 1 wheel the way I am supposed to for crosswind landings!!!
So, it was a really productive day, almost 2 hours of solo flying, it was great.
