Yesterday was a holiday for me, so I decided to take a quick loop to the north east of my home airport, Sanderson Field in Shelton WA. I topped off the tanks in my Zodiac 601 XL and warmed up my Jabiru 3300 as I taxied over to runway 23, two mouse clicks sent an email to family and friends telling them that I was taking, and letting them know that they could track my flight with a web based map. Knowing that some of them would follow my flight made it feel as though I was sharing this little adventure. I took off and flew north east along the Hood canal, then over the San Juan Islands. Using a trackball-mouse I navigated the GPS fed tablet computer to easily thread my way between airspace of Sea-Tac and Whidbey Island NUW. Heading east towards the northern Cascade Range I picked a pretty river valley that would give me plenty of time to make a leisurely ascent needed to cross the mountains, no need to claw my way up at a full throttle 1000 FPM climb. Looking off to the south I saw a sizable airport, a mouse click told me that it was Arlington field. Another click told me that I could get automotive fuel there, since I had full tanks I didn’t bother to check the price. My Jabiru 3300 would be just as happy with automotive fuel as it is with 100LL. The air was smooth over the mountains, so I settled in at about 8000’, above most of the nearby peaks. I found a comfortable throttle setting giving me close to 100 KTS @ less than 5 gallons per HR, EGTs and CHTs are always cool at that altitude. Panning ahead on my map I saw very a long skinny lake running south east, it was labeled “Chelan Lake”. The valley holding the lake offered an opportunity to make a gradual descent out of the mountains. I still had an internet connection, but knew that I would drop it before long, so I did a quick wikipedia search and learned that the lake is 50 miles long and has a ferry running on it. I made my way over to the lake and throttled back to about 1800 RPMs, this gave me a fuel burn of about 3 gallons per hr., then I set my trim tab to keep my speed at about 95 kts. Sliding down out of the mountains, into the narrow valley, I watched the boats on the lake and watched the landscape turn brown. My Dynon D180’s OAT reminded me that it’s “hot” on that side of the state. The treeless desolation quickly gave way to relatively green Columbia River agriculture and I turned south to follow the river. As I spotted airports on the ground I would check their details on the computer, occasionally tuning in to listen to traffic. The tools that I have onboard provide lots of information, very quickly, leaving me more time to enjoy the world outside. The flat brown country was a nice change of pace from the dense solid green that I have become accustomed to, but after a while I felt an itch to get back to the beauty of the mountains. Looking ahead I could see what looked like a wide valley running North West. The map told me that I90 ran up the valley; zooming out a bit showed me that I could use that valley to make my way over to Mt. Rainier. I figured it was a nice day to do a loop around Rainier, since it’s 14410’ tall I had to decide just how big that loop was going to be. The higher I went the smaller the loop. I was at about 5000’ and had about 50 miles to cover, so I decided to see what 500’ per min. at about 6 gallons per hr. would give me. By the time I got relatively close to the mountain I was at 11000’. I got a nice view of three local mountains from left to right: Adams, Rainier and St. Helens. I had lost my internet connection at about 10000’, but I knew that anyone tracking me on-line wouldn’t worry too much, since they would see all of my last reported flight and engine data; they know that cell modems don’t work well at high altitude. Even at 11000’ I was climbing at 300 FPM, burring 6 GPH at about 85 KTS. I know from experience that it'll keep right on climbing through 16000', so I just let my 601XL and Jabiru 3300 work happily together as I continued my turn around the mountain. At 13500 I looked up to see a tent and what looked like people standing next to it. I didn’t want to disturb their mountain solitude so I kept my distance, but my zoom lens pulled them in and digitized their image for later viewing. I thought about how odd it was to be at 13500’ looking UP at people on the ground. Then I thought about how odd it was for them to be looking DOWN onto the top of my little airplane. I hoped that they were enjoying the day as much as I was! When I got around to the downwind side of the mountain the 21 KT wind caused a few bumps. I have wind speed and direction information on my Dynon, so I was expecting the bumps, I just banked off to the right and slid away from the snow and ice. I had flown for close to four hours, and burned through close to 20 of my 30 gallons of fuel, it was time to go home and take the dogs for a mountain bike ride. I aimed my extended flight path line on the map at Shelton, about 90 miles away, and settled in for a long slide down to earth. When I got back to my hanger my neighbor asked me about my flight. When I told him about my flight he asked me where I had stopped for fuel. I told him that I didn’t stop. I’m not sure he believed me; I think he burns close to twice what I do. For me it’s really not about economy, or technology; it’s about what those things let me do, see, learn.


Flight Time: 4.5 hours
Flight distance: 440 miles
Average speed: 99 mph
Fuel burned: 20 gallons
Max altitude: 13900
Aircraft: Zodiac 601XL
Engine: Jabiru 3300
Instruments: Dynon D180
Tablet computer software: Windows XP
RMS Flightsoft & Vista moving map
Smith Brothers Aircraft tracking and monitoring system.
Camera: Canon Powershot SX10 IS