Just got back last night.
Quick summary.
Load up 182 with more stuff that it was designed to carry. Take off and fly to Erie and land to clear US customs. Wind gust catches door and somehow the latch sticks so door cannot be closed.
Freeze butt off for half and hour trying to get door unstuck. Finally after taking door off and jiggleing the latch it decided to work again and door is remounted and we finally clear Erie. My slight cold has turned into a hacking cough after being outside freezing.
Flying for almost 3 hours and land at Greensborough airport and buy fuel. Fuel in the states is not all between 3.5 and 4 a gallon. Have to wait 10 minutes for a bunch of jets to land and take off before getting clearance. Burned 2 gallons in that time. Expensive wait!
Take off and continue to file VFR flight plan and use flight following. The autopilot holds the heading very percisely and all I have to do is trim for alt. I guess the ATC was impressed by our predictable flight. Fly by a major airport and see big jets passing same alt on our left and one pass in front left to right on a climbout. In Canada the ATC would have dropped us from 7500 feet to 2500 to avoid the busy airways. In the US they just spaced the departing and arriving flights around us. Very cool.
With an amazing tailwind and aggressive leaning realize that the second fuel stop does not seem to be needed. Arrive Lakeland at 8 pm from Greensboro after 4.4 hours flying. Still have 40 mins of fuel left, but decided not to fly past 4 hours anymore.
Have to camp on the other side of Lakeland as Sun and Fun closes at 7 pm each night. Set up a tent and sleep the night but have to break camp and do it all over next morning. Grrrr.
Get a nice spot right beside the place where they do emergency repairs in the vintage aircraft parking area. Lots of Warbirds and Yaks and other interesting planes right around.
Stay Tues Wed night and fly out Thurs morning.
Had a stupid cold the whole time I was there so did not get a great sleep each night. But saw many interesting planes. I am amazed at the work some people have done to restore even ordinary planes to pristine condition.
Saw Glacier Girl. The pilot was flying it in simulated ground attack. Lots of passes. Amazing p-38 and very nicely put back together after being a complete scrap case when they took it out of the ice.
Food is expensive and not that good really. Oshkosh is better but Florida is nice to escape to this time of year. People are friendly and many will come up and ask about your plane no matter how ordinary it is.
Flight back took off VFR and encountered a low cloud layer just north of Lakeland. Climbed above it and fought at 15k headwind. Heard many VRF pilots gettting nervous trying to find an airport in the cloud to land at. After 3.8 hours of VFR over the top finally cleared the clouds and 10 minutes later landed and a really nice little airport with resonable fuel and even a shower for pilots to use.
Made it back to Toronto at 7:30 after leaving Sun and Fun at 8 am.
