Source: 2017 Q4 Beartracks, Russ Erb
In June 2017, I took a trip from Rosamond CA (L00) with the intention of riding the Cumbres and Toltec Scenic Railroad in Chama NM. The nearest acceptable public use airport was in Pagosa Springs CO (KPSO), about a one hour rental car drive away.
One of the big planning factors for this trip was that the weather would be the typical summer pattern: reasonably okay in the morning, getting hot and windy as the day went on. I could address the heat somewhat by taking my B-Kool ice air conditioner, but the only mitigation for the winds was to haul my a** out of bed early in the morning.
Because I would be flying at pressure altitudes between 9,500 feet and 11,500 feet, it was time to drag the ol’ oxygen bottle out, which had not seen use since 2013. Yes, the FAA says you don’t need to use supplemental oxygen below 12,500 feet, but that rule is actually more based on operational requirements for DC-3s than any extensive tests of physiological data. I have determined through informal tests that using oxygen at these lower altitudes has a significant effect on reducing fatigue during long flights.
The smaller problem was that the bottle only had 500 psi of oxygen in it (2000 psi is full). The bigger problem was that I bought the bottle in 2009. Because it is an aluminum bottle, the law stipulates that it must have a hydrostatic pressure test every 5 years, which was due in 2014. Since I hadn’t needed the bottle, I hadn’t gotten the test done. My wife insisted that I would take it with me, so I got the bottle down to a local business that specializes in fire extinguishers. They were able to do the “hydro test” but they don’t refill the bottle. After the test, I took the bottle to another shop at a local airport to get it re-filled.
I also took my wife’s pulse oximeter along on the flight to monitor my breathing. She’s into biology and it was her Valentine’s Day present in 2011. It’s still her favorite Valentine’s Day present ever.
The night before departure, I loaded the airplane as much as I could and completed the preflight inspection. On Monday 26 June, I hauled myself out of bed at 0500 and was rolling down the runway by 0630. I climbed to my cruising altitude of 9,500 feet, and was surprised to find out that I had a 51 knot tailwind! Not quite the 70 knot tailwind I remember in 1999 going to Sun n’ Fun, but welcome nonetheless. That should help make this day shorter. Of course, I was also hoping that the winds would die down by Wednesday when I was coming back!

The tailwind would continue, but was down to about 25 knots at Kingman AZ, and then to mostly crosswind at Pagosa Springs.
Surface winds at Kingman (KIGM) were about 20 knots as promised, but were at least aligned with one run-way. Landing was not a problem, but taxiing and refu-eling were more challenging with all of that wind.
I stopped in Kingman not because the fuel was the cheapest in the general area, but because it is in a good location and at a reasonably high elevation to minimize descending and climbing. (Laughlin/Bullhead Intl (KIFP) is close by, but at 2742 feet lower ele-vation and generally higher fuel prices, it was a non-starter.) Additionally, a big benefit of Kingman was that I had been there multiple times before and knew my way around the airport.
I knew that by eating breakfast early, at some point during the second leg of the flight my stomach clock would be expecting lunch. Because of the rush to get to the destination before the heat and winds got out of hand, I had chosen not to stop to eat lunch on the ground. Instead I employed a technique from my days in C-130s back in the early 1990s—bagels. I would propose that the humble bagel is about the perfect cockpit food. Personally I prefer the cinnamon and raisin variety. The bagel is very dense, so by eating just one I usually feel like I have eaten a whole meal. The bagel is not crumbly, so it doesn’t make a mess in the cockpit. The bagel doesn’t require special handling, such as refrigeration. Finally, the bagel is moist enough that it can be eaten without supplementary water or drink, which is good both for logistics and for physiological range.
Departing Kingman, I first climbed to 9,500 feet, which would be okay for ground clearance, but only 800 feet above pattern altitude at the destination. After a brief period, I started to notice more bumps at 9,500 feet, so I slowly climbed to 11,500 feet in hopes of smoother air. Rather than do a maximum rate climb (I had more than enough time), I just left the airplane in the cruise configuration and pulled the nose up slightly to lose a few knots. Additionally, like any good glider pilot, I allowed the rising air that was causing the turbulence to help me climb as well.
On reaching 11,500 feet, I saw yet another benefit of the big engine that another homebuilder talked me into all those years ago. Thanks to the high altitude, the true airspeed is the same, but the indicated air-speed is less, and the cruise drag is less. With a little bit of a tailwind and a fuel flow of nominally 9.1 gallons per hour, I was getting a specific range (mileage) of up to 15 nautical miles per gallon at 122 knots true airspeed.
The leg from Kingman to Pagosa Springs was about as long as I dare try in my Bearhawk. At 355 nm, with a planning fuel flow of 11.0 gph (a reasonable number at low altitudes), the leg should take 3.3 hours and leave me with 16.1 gallons remaining (about 1.5 hours). With the favorable winds and low fuel flows at altitude, this leg took 3.1 hours and 22.4 gallons remaining.



Flying into high altitude airports can be a mind-bending experience. Cruising at 11,500 feet seems like it should be really high, but when the pattern altitude is 8,663 feet, that descent is only 2,837 feet. That’s less descent than I do flying from Mountain Valley (L94) or Tehachapi (KTSP) to Rosamond.

I arrived at 12:18, and as you can see in the picture the clouds were already starting to form. The afternoon rains are a real thing in Colorado summer afternoons, though it didn’t actually rain this day.
The rental car service was prompt and right to the airplane. It may sound obvious, but the best way I have found to deal with rental cars is to call the FBO first. I have known some FBOs that actually act as the rental car agent. If not, ask them if there are any agencies that they regularly work with. In this case, Enterprise brought the car to the airport, and allowed me to just leave it at the air-port when I was done.

The forecast for Wednesday was the same—getting hot and windy as the day progressed. Once again, I was up at 0500 local to beat feet out of there. I was concerned about being able to make it all the way from Pagosa Springs to Kingman if there were high headwinds. Thus, I formed a plan to divert into Valle (40G), south of Grand Canyon and about 50 minutes short of Kingman, if it looked like I was going to arrive at Kingman with less than 10 gallons remaining.
After rapidly gathering up my stuff, eating a bagel, and loading the airplane, I was off about 07:05. With the big engine and relatively lightly loaded, takeoff and climb performance were not an issue. Again, climbing to 10,500 feet sounds like it should take a long time, but since it was less than 3000 feet up it didn’t take long at all.
In actuality, the winds were only 15 to 25 knots headwind, and the projected fuel remaining at Kingman wandered around 16 to 18 gallons remaining.

On the way out, I kept a record of which frequencies I talked to ATC on for flight following and the rough locations where frequency changes were made. Sure enough, on the way back I just proceeded back up the frequency list. It was much nicer being able to anticipate the frequency I would be given rather than just being surprised by it.
While flying back I noticed a seemingly weird response of the aircraft while flying on autopilot. I’m a big fan of having an autopilot for workload reduction, especially if I am the only qualified pilot on board. Normally it works really well, but every now and then the nose would start pitching up, airspeed would drop, the ball would go way out to the right, and the airplane would bank about 10 to 15 degrees to the right. It did this several times before I realized what was going on. The airplane would fly into sink (glider pilot talk for descending air). The autopilot would respond to the loss of altitude by pulling the nose up to climb, which caused the loss of airspeed. With the nose pitched up, the flow through the propeller caused increased P-factor, which tried to swing the nose to the left. Trying to maintain a ground track, the autopilot would bank to the right, resulting in the ball moving way to the right. The solution was simply to disconnect the autopilot, ride out the sink, and when the lift brought me back up to altitude, re-engage the autopilot.
I finally reached Kingman in 3.7 hours, one of my longest flights in the Bearhawk, with 16.8 gallons remaining. Once again, the winds were about 20 knots down a runway.
Another non-eventful leg put me back at Rosamond at about 1215 local, but as I feared, the winds were sort of down the runway at about 24 knots. After fighting the winds down to the runway, with about seven wheel touches before they both remained on the ground, I re-confirmed why I don’t fly in winds like that just for fun!