Last week I had the chance to visit our friends in New Hampshire for a couple of days. We wanted to play with their toys, since those airplanes need regular exercise and I needed a break from studying for the CPL. The first two days were solid IMC but on Wednesday the weather finally allowed some flying. I did 25 landings the first day for the fun of it…and for the FAA taildragger endorsement.
These were the toys….a 150hp PA18 Super Cub, a 90hp J3 Cub and a 150hp C150.
KVSF, Hartness State Airport, Springfield, Vermont
It´s hard to beat low level flying with an open door. Flying the J3 along the Connecticut River at 500ft.
We said `Hi` to a couple of guys at Claremont Airport, just a few miles away. The hangar is almost 100 years old!
The next day we went to the WAD, the Wentworth Aerodrome Fly-Out.
This Super Cub seems to land off-airport quite often!
On Friday, my last day of my visit, we went for a great round trip in gorgeous weather, Indian Summer at its best. I turned out to be lucky, because the following days were mostly IMC again. This is Mount Ascutney, just north of Springfield, which makes navigation very easy on the way home on days like this.
Our first stop was Wentworth again. What a beautiful day, and what a great (private!) airfield! I talked to a few guys about the differences in aviation on both sides of the great pond, and they appreciate their freedom a lot, probably even more after telling them about landing fees, “Flugleiter” and fuel prices.
The next leg was a short one to Post Mills airport, a nice glider field right next to a lake in the Vermont hills.
The guy who runs the place is a balloon pilot and quite a character. He has a cool collection of old stuff like this Ford Model T and all kinds of balloon baskets he made by himself.
From Post Mills we went for a one-hour flight across the beautiful New England Indian Summer towards Northern Light airport at Lake Champlain. The views were very nice, especially at higher elevations the leafs were already very colourful.
Approaching Lake Champlain the landscape changed, but views remained stunning. Northern Lights is a private airfield and seaplane base just south of the Canadian border.
This is a homemade device used to launch seaplanes from a grass runway. The airplanes can be landed on a wet grass runway without problems.
From Northern Lights we flew south along Lake Champlain for our destination Basin Harbour, a beautiful golf-course-quality grass airfield with Lake access. Never much higher than 500ft we saw some nice houses on the way.
It was now time for the last leg home, along some of the most popular skiing sites in the eastern US. After one more landing at Springfield the adventure was over.
My flight home went two days later from Washington D.C., which gave me the opportunity to visit the Smithsonian Museum(s).
There´s quite some diversity here….J3, B707 and Concorde.
These two airplanes both flew around the world.
These flew across the Atlantic. Lindbergh´s Spirit of St. Louis and Amelia Earhart´s Lockheed Vega.
Rocket ships….Bell X-1 from the late 1940´s, the North American X-15 from the 1960´s, and the privately build SpaceShipOne from 2004.
And this is how it all began. Amazing how far we have come in such a short time.
What a great report – have not flown the J-3, am told handling is even nicer than the Super Cub. Well done on the tailwheel endorsement.
Very nice report, thanks for sharing, that black Cessna looks very slick !
I wonder how many Wright Flyer replicas are out there? But it seems as many as air museums in the US !
Wonderful photos and report, thanks! Best time of the year to fly in New England…
Apparently it sucks to do such things ;-) Thanks for sharing!
