The Shake Down Trip

When all good trips need a Shake Down Trip or two prior to the big event.
So with this and a few more things in mind we decided to fly up to Sharks Bay for the weekend of our 15 wedding anniversary. I planned this trip using the usual FP3000, and range was not an issue. This meant I only had to deal with Perth Center (Air Traffic control), navigation, and weather and all would be good. Shark bay is around a 3.5hour flight which is a nice distance, nothing taxing but a reasonable test for the Minister of War and Finance (Wife with very low passenger hours) .

My aim was to ensure that the experience was nice and uneventful to ease her into this flying caper. I chose no to file a flight plan as the morning of the flight saw a broken cloud base at 3500ft and headwinds increasing as height increased. So I chose to drop under Perth Controlled airspace, rather than wait around for Perth Clearance Delivery to let me through (seems to be a problem of late).

The trip up saw a great days flying, 3.5Hours flying with a stop over in Geraldton to top up with fuel in case we decided to fly inland (over farmland where there is no fuel stops) on the way home.

Ningaloo Resort is a beautifully setting, pricey for what it is, $230/night for a standard Ozzie motel room, but with great views of the bay.

We went sailing on an open 60ft catamaran on Saturday, to watch dolphins and dhugon. We where treated with glassy waters warm but not hot sun and light winds. Magic.

Sunday saw us ready to fly home. The weather was deteriorating over the next two days and the earlier we left the better it was going to be.

According to the BOM Avdesk man I spoke to the front was due to hit around 2-3pm at Geraldton. Well they got the location right but the time was out by about 4 hours. Right at the time we were flying through there.

Needless to say we turned around and flew back to Kalbarri. I am sure CASA would say there was a bit of IFR flight in the process but training, caution, & autopilot paid off.
So we waited in Kalbarri for 30 odd hours while 3 inches of rain fell. beers in bed watching crime shows was not a bad way to spend your 15th wedding anniversary.

Late Monday afternoon we managed to take off and get past Geraldton where the weather was magic again. We arrived back at Collie at "very last light" in some light drizzle.

The Minister of War and Finance loved the weekend although the "near" IFR did not fit my promise of nice and uneventful flying, and being a little claustrophobic doesn't help when the visibility drops. She seems to have a talent for navigating which please me no end. although I had the Garmin 430 to tell me where I was she stuck to the map and watch. Very accurate and very helpful. This will be something that will be of great use when we head on the big trip.

As for JTT, she was the star of the trip, magnificently smooth and stable, regardless of the weather, she loved the crosswind landings and didn't look like missing a beat.

Learning's
- Nibbles required as very little options of grabbing a bite even at the large regional airports
- Fuel computer is a little conservative (15L per tank)
- GPS flight plans work well
- MP3 player through the Stereo works well but is a bit quiet
- Wife is probably a better navigator than me.