Spring Break 2014

Last month was our 5th annual visit to Treasure Cay, Bahamas.  We had a fabulous time and stayed
at the Bahama Beach Club in John Cash's unit named "Bahama Breeze".  We have stayed there once before on our Memorial Day Weekend 2010 visit.  All the places we have stayed have been great and Bahamas Breeze has one of the best views that allow you to enjoy the beauty of Treasure Cay Beach even while inside!  I think only Pam's condo (Sandollar Dreams) tops this feature so far!

I had an itch before our trip to change up our route to the Bahamas.  The default route is to proceed down the coast of Florida until you get to Melbourne, then turn out over the water and head to Freeport, then direct into Treasure Cay (MYAT).  I have noticed over the years that a lot of aircraft seem to be arriving into MYAT from the northwest.  The problem with that route is that if you turn out early to make it happen, ATC needs you to be at 13,000 feet or above to provide radar services.  I really wanted to come in over the very northern part of the Abacos to see how much better the views below might be before landing.  So I took a chance and filed IFR for a route that would take me to Melbourne and then direct to Treasure Cay; basically cutting out Freeport.

I filed for 8000 feet and got cleared as filed!  Unfortunately it didn't stay that way, but it all worked out in the end.  I wasn't worried about the over-the-water time because it was almost the same by the time you reach Walker's Cay.  Just before we reached Daytona Beach, ATC offered us direct to Treasure Cay so I said yes!  As soon as we were handed off to Orlando Approach, we were diverted back south to stay out of some active restricted areas.  Once we were allowed to head for our destination again, I was told I either needed to climb to 13,000 feet or proceed further south towards Grand Bahama Island to maintain radar services.  I didn't want to do either.  So after thinking about it for a minute, I asked ATC if I could cancel IFR and just proceed VFR with flight following and stay with them for as long as I could at 7500 feet.  This may not sound like a big deal, but I wasn't sure how this would be handled since I was still smack in the middle of the ADIZ and didn't want to cause any problems.  ATC, and now I was talking to Miami Center, said no problem!  So we continued on and surprisingly we were able to stay in radar service with them quite a bit further than they had informed.

The flight over the ocean was peaceful and soon we could see Walker's Cay.  We cancelled flight following and descended to about 2000 feet as we cruised along the North Abaco cays until we reached the Treasure Cay airport.  This change to the routine was definitely worth it!  The views were amazing.  Abby and I took turns pointing out the sights and taking pictures.  Unfortunately Kristi missed the whole thing since she pretty much slept the whole flight until just before we landed.  Oh well, she liked the pictures though!

Our favorite taxi driver, Sydney Hart, was at the airport when we arrived.  Clearing Immigration & Customs was the usual painless experience except since our last visit we now have to pay a $50 landing fee to Customs.  Personally, I'm still not happy about the new fees like a lot of other pilots are, but the Bahamian Government wins this one because it's still such an amazing place to enjoy.  There are still now tie-down fees at MYAT so that's good.

We got to the Bahama Beach Club around 1 pm and were very happy to find the condo and our golf cart ready and waiting!  We made a quick trip to the grocery store for some essentials and then hit the beach!  We spent most mornings on the playing on the beach and then after lunch we would hang out at the pool.  There seemed to be a lot of folks around, but not as many as last year.  Unlike last year's chilly stay, we enjoyed almost perfect weather all week!

This year we ended up making most of our meals at the condo.  We enjoyed a few lunches and treats, like conch fritters, at the pool grill, but it was just easier to do things for ourselves and mainly on our schedule!  A few times a week the Bahama Beach Club has themed dinner nights.  If you do go, the Friday Steak Night is the best!  Pay for the upgrade and get the Filet & Lobster Tail.  You will not be disappointed.  We didn't end up attending any of these dinners this time, but the girls enjoyed the after dinner bonfires that are usually done.

I did get to dive two days, but most mornings for me started off with a nice long walk on the gorgeous Treasure Cay Beach.  I had different walking partners each morning and what a pair of posers they are!

We all went one morning towards the west end of the area to a place called Carleton Point.  Carleton Point is the area where loyalist refugees from New Your City settled in 1783.  The winds had picked up earlier in the week for a little bit and the girls were able to find some very cool treasures that had washed up.

By most afternoons, we were all pretty worn out from the days' activities.  It didn't bother me to just chill out in the condo with some rum punch and enjoy the view while the girls got some down time.  Towards the last half of the week the low tide cycle had shifted to the late afternoon which meant it was prime time for beach walking and shell finding again!

As it always does, time just flew by.  After 7 nights it was time to go home.  As I made the rounds in the morning to return the golf cart and pay our tab, I overheard conversations among folks that the phones were not working on the island including cell phones.  I really didn't pay it much attention until we got to the airport and were ready to leave.  I had already filed our eApis manifest and flight plan online the day before so all I had to do was make the required phone call to US Customs & Border Protection (CBP) prior to departure.  Most all the airports of entry in the Bahamas have blue phones available to pilots for free.  All the speed dial numbers are posted and you can easily call Flight Service to file flight plans and get weather briefings as well as phone any of the US Customs locations..............when the phones are working!!!!!!!  Uh oh. 

Failure to make this call and just "showing up" can supposedly result in a $5000 fine.  Yup, a little panic set in.  The Bahamian Customs Officer tried her personal cell phone for me multiple times with no luck.  I even turned my phone on knowing if I got through it would be an expensive phone call, but at least not as much as the fine!  No luck either.  I resolved to just take off, see if ATC could help at all once I opened my flight plan, and just plead forgiveness from the CBP Officers in Ft Pierce until I thought of one more thing.  I remembered a sign in the Customs and Immigration building that said "BTC WiFi Hotspot"  So after loading the plane and finishing my preflight, I headed back to the building to give it a try.  I turned on the the iPad, and quickly found the Customs wireless router listed.  It let me connect with no password!  Ok, let's see if the internet works..........yes!!!!!!!  Quickly over to Facebook and I made this quick post:

"All land lines and cell phones are down in Treasure Cay. Could someone please call Ft Pierce US Customs for us and make a notice of arrival for us? Phone number is 772-461-1733. Choose the prompt to make a notice of arrival. Please tell the officer that answers it is for aircraft tail number N424RM arriving FT Pierce airport at 1330. Please post here if you are successful so they don't get a lot of calls. Thank you. We are taking off now."

Then I prayed someone would help, loaded up the family, and took off right on time.  Climbing through 6000 feet we checked in with Miami Center and picked up our IFR clearance into Ft Pierce.  Halfway across Grand Bahama Island we started to cut through a few cloud layers.  Just before arriving, we had to make a few diversions for weather.  We were IMC off and on and picked up a bit of the rain.  It was maybe moderate rain at most and I didn't mind at that point because I saw it as a free and easy rinse for the plane after she sat  all week in the salt air.

Since you aren't allowed to use cell phones in the Customs Building until you are cleared and back outside, I turned my phone on just be fore we shutdown on the CBP ramp and was so relived to see that my sister-in-law was successfully able to make the call for us!  So we cleared Customs with ease and no fine!

After a partial fill of AVGAS and a to-go order of food, we were back in the air for the last leg home.  It was uneventful as usual, which is a good thing, and as much as we were all happy to be home, we were wishing we were still in Treasure Cay!

I did take the GoPro camera this trip and have been very happy with the results.  I'm still working on the clips and hope to have a short movie about this trip to share soon so stay tuned.............

More New Friends, A New Roof, and Conch Fritters!!!!!

Last month's Bahamas Habitat Fly In & Help Out Event was another huge success.   Most folks met up at Orlando Executive Airport (KORL) for lunch and then the mass departure for the Bahamas began!  Over 30 pilots and passengers in 8+ planes made the trip to serve the great people of Eleuthera, Bahamas.  The itinerary was the same as it had been for previous events.

This time I had two friends from church join me.  Both of them had never been in a small plane before, but that didn't damper their excitement.  A little over 2 hours after leaving Orlando, we were the first plane to touch down in Governor's Harbour (MYEM), Eleuthera.  We had loaded up the plane with various supplies that had been waiting to be delivered to the camp which almost turned into a little bit of an ordeal.  The customs officer, freshly transferred from Nassau, was very keen to ALL the boxes we had brought with us.  Luckily you are allowed a $100 exemption per person from import duties so we managed to write up an agreed upon manifest and kept it below that mark!

Odyssey Aviation, the local FBO at the airport, was gracious enough to meet all the pilots and crews with catered finger foods, drinks and gift bags for everyone upon arrival.  They also were generous to donate $3500 to the Zion's Children's Home on Current Island; a project hugely supported by the Bahamas Habitat.  So if you find yourself in the Bahamas and in need of FBO services, please give your patronage to Odyssey Aviation to show your thanks for their support of their communities.

This trip, we worked in the settlement of South Palmetto Point.  We served a nice older gentleman and his aunt as we repaid her roof, demolished the crumbling half of his house, and finished putting on a new roof on the remaining front half of his home.  We did this over two days and it's amazing what can be accomplished by so many in just a short time.

After working the 2nd day, a group of us headed for the airport for a little island hopping.  I let John and Doug take turns flying the plane and they did very well.  After a quick turn at North Eleuthera to load the fuel we needed to get home, we flew towards the Exuma Islands chain and stopped at Staniel Cay and walked to the yacht club for lunch.  Unlike last February, the power was on!  So we enjoyed a fabulous lunch and of course the obligatory conch fritters!

Sunday's flight home was none eventful.  The weather was perfect, clearing customs in Ft Pierce was painless as usual, and we were home in Jacksonville by early afternoon.  It was an amazing four days and I truly enjoyed see some familiar faces, making new friends, and sharing this experience with Doug and John.  The main conversation we had when we got home was,"When are we going back?"  Soon I hope!  The next event will be February 20- 23, 2014.  Mark you calendars and join us!

Here is a slide show of our photos.  It also includes some GoPro video while flying low along the beautiful islands of Exuma.

And The Thunderstorms Parted........

I flat out refuse to allow myself to get into a situation where we NEED to get somewhere in the plane when conditions aren't right.  I'll drive, fly commercially, or just delay till the conditions are safe.  We planned to come home on Saturday which left us at least an extra day if needed.  The forecasts for Saturday were perfect for us to get from Treasure Cay (MYAT) to Fort Pierce, FL (KFPR) to clear Customs.  On the other hand, the forecast for home was showing 50% or greater chances of thunderstorms associated with a cold front moving in from the northwest.

If we waited an extra day in Treasure Cay the weather may have been better, but I would have to contend with the remnants of the front and forecasted high winds.  I decided to go ahead and leave Saturday and if need be we would stay the night in Florida somewhere and finish the leg home on Sunday.  I filed my IACO Flight Plan and eAPIS manifest in the morning.  I was a little worried about the eAPIS manifest since the Internet went out the night before.  I can always file my flight plan over the phone or in the air, but I have no other options for the manifest.  Luckily the Internet was back up in the morning and Sydney picked us up at 10:30 am and we were loaded up and wheels up around noon.

When we flew down I had a lot of static on the last frequency with Miami Center.  I thought it was them, but it was me!  I had this happen before in the Arrow as well.  With a certain active frequency dialed into Com 1, and a different one dialed in to the active side of Com 2, that combination causes static on my Com 1.  It is by far not a common event and this time it just so happened when I had 134.2 dialed in to Com 1 and 122.8 dialed in to Com 2.  When we departed Treasure Cay and I turned back to Com 1 to pick up my clearance from Miami Center, the static was still there.  That led me to recall  that previous experience with the Arrow and as soon as I hit the "flip-flop" button on Com 2 and took 122.8 out of the active slot, the static disappeared!

Anyway, we got our usual clearance to Fort Pierce (KFPR) :  ZFP Angee Direct at 8000 feet.  About an hour and fifteen minutes after leaving Treasure Cay, we were shut down on the US Customs & Border Patrol ramp at Fort Pierce (KFPR).  During the flight I kept panning the Garmin 496with XM Weather to check out the conditions at home.  Sure enough a huge thunderstorm was building west of Jacksonville and moving east.  The one thing I did notice was that nothing yet was developing south and there was a huge gap between that cell and the line of thunderstorms behind it.  I told Kristi that instead of having lunch at the Airport Tiki like we usually did, we would make this a quick turn.  Clear Customs, get gas, and get back in the air for the hour and a half flight home.  I figured we could at least get closer to home and still have numerous "outs" along the way like Daytona Beach and St Augustine to stay the night if need be.

With one last check of the radar at the FBO, the weather was cooperating so we launched for home.  We climbed to 11,000 feet to remain well above most of the weather.  We dodged a few build ups here and there, but for the most part we stayed in the clear.  As we progressed north, the huge cell was right over our home airport, KCRG, but moving east at 16 knots.  The gap behind it was still there and holding which was great.  As we flew over Daytona I could pick up the ATIS for KCRG which had now issued as special weather update for thunderstorms and heavy rain.  No worries, we were 30 plus minutes out so things were looking great.

We could see a nice cell building over Palatka to the west as we passed, but we were nowhere near it.   Once we we got handed off to the Jacksonville Approach controllers, they reported that the thunderstorm was now moving offshore and to expect a visual approach at home.  I told them I visually agreed with what their  radar showed and thanked them for the perfect timing!  A few minutes later we touched down on Runway 32 in clear, dry skies.  We unloaded and secured the plane, went to the grocery store and McDonald's, and got home about 15 minutes before the rest of the front and thunderstorms arrived!

Spring Break was unfortunately over, but we had an awesome time.  The storms had parted perfectly for us and we were glad to be home.  The price of the XM Weather subscription, in my opinion, is worth every penny.  I don't use it to to allow me to push the envelope, but to keep us safe and always aware of our outs when needed.  That's the key: ALWAYS LEAVE YOURSELF AN OUT!

Feb 2012 Fly In & Help Out - An Extra Day To Enjoy!

I was lucky enough to not have the duty at work so I could participate in this event. To make it even better, Monday was Washington's Birthday providing us an extra day to enjoy the Bahamas. Pete managed to make an even trade at work for his time off so we went ahead and booked ourselves a night at a local condo for after the Bahamas Habitat Fly In & Help Out Event was over.

When we got up Sunday morning, everyone was prepping for their departures back to the States. A cold front was pushing through northern Florida so most everyone opted to leave Camp first thing in the morning to safely get back to Florida before the weather. Pete and I hung around finishing our chores and chatting with the staff and one other couple who was delaying their departure. Pete humbly swept and mopped the men's wing rooms and bathroom while I took the easy route and stuffed all the used linens and towels into laundry bags and helped load them on a truck.

Jerry, our gypsy from New York, decided to stay behind with us to fly back home on Monday. He managed to get a cheap flight home from Jacksonville on Monday night so I was glad he would be joining us. Jerry also had rented a car the day before so now we had transportation to our condo and the airport! We packed up, said our thank you's & good byes, and left Camp around 11:00 am. Enroute to the condo we stopped to look at some properties that Jerry was interested in. Some places were very fancy and I think all had great views.

We checked in to our condo located in the Pineapple Fields Beach Hotel and got settled. This place is awesome! We stayed in a ground floor, one bedroom unit that had a king bed and a queen size sofa/sleeper. It came with a full kitchen, full bath, TVs, iPod stereo dock, front & back decks, and we even had a bit of an ocean view. The condo and furnishings looked brand new. The complex also has a good size pool to use and beautifully landscaped grounds. The price is very reasonable for the amazing accommodations.

After we got settled, first on the to-do list was to head across the street to Tippy's on the beach for lunch and...............some Rum Punch! I ordered some conch fritters as an appetizer and these things were the biggest I have ever seen. They were delicious as well and went very nicely with my rum punch! After we finished off the fritters, I had the Lobster & Shrimp Pasta in a Tomato Cream Sauce that was wonderful. The shrimp was good size and there were huge chunks of lobster just as big as the shrimp, if not bigger. Lunch was not inexpensive, but it was worth it!

After lunch we went back to the condo, got changed, grabbed our snorkel gear, and hit the beach. The condo also came with two beach/camp chairs which was very nice. Right off the beach was a lot of reef to explore. The water was a little cool, but I wore my shorty wetsuit. Pete just wore his swim trunks and survived pretty well! I probably spent well over an hour exploring the reef and taking pictures. It was very pretty and the conditions were perfect. When we got done, we stopped by Tippy's again for more rum drinks and went back to the condo to relax until dinner.

I took advantage of the down time to file the eAPIS manifest for our flight home on Monday. It has gotten a lot easier now that you can reuse old information to file. We walked back to Tippy's for dinner and found our spots at the bar still open so we sat down for dinner. The place was packed so I ordered some shrimp appetizers before our main course. Pete and I both ordered lobster tails and they were great! As usual with the local catch, the tails were huge. After dinner Pete and Jerry delved in to a somewhat lively theological debate. It was educating and entertaining for me. I quickly realized that debate topic is just as touchy as discussing politics! They threatened to keep the debate going during the flight home, but I promptly reminded them I can just isolate myself on the intercom, enjoy my music, and they could debate all they wanted by themselves!

I had a very restful night’s sleep in my huge king bed and when we woke up in the morning we walked down to the office/bakery/deli for some coffee and pastries. We could see the remnants of the cold front approaching from the northwest. The skies looked a little dark and I started to wonder what the weather would be like for our flight home. Never fear; the clouds arrived, it rained a little for five minutes, and it was clear the rest of the morning. After breakfast I spent an hour or so walking the beach. I think I'd lose some weight if we lived on the beach because I could make those walks every day without any complaints!

We loaded up the car at 11:00am, checked out and headed for the airport. As usual in the Bahamas, some services can be spotty. The Internet wasn't working that morning so I had to call the Flight Service Station from the airport to file our flight plan and then call Ft Pierce Customs to notify them of our arrival time.

We departed shortly after noon and had a pleasant flight back. Passing through 6000 feet I picked up our clearance from Miami Center and was cleared as filed (MYEM-ZFP-ANGEE-KFPR) at 8000 feet.  We had to deal with 30+ knot headwinds enroute to Fort Pierce (KFPR), but I didn’t mind because it just meant I could enjoy the views of the Bahamas a little longer. We made an uneventful arrival in to KFPR and cleared Customs without issue. The officer was kind enough to settle a question that came up when we were at the camp. It IS OK to bring lobster tails back from the Bahamas as long as it is in season in Florida and you do not exceed the catch limit per Florida's regulations. It is currently 6 tails per person. I'll have to remember that!

After we cleared Customs, we went next door to the Airport Tiki and had some lunch. While we ate, the FBO brought our plane over from the Custom's ramp and fulfilled my fuel request. With our final trip bills paid we loaded up one more time and headed to Jacksonville. We cruised along under clear skies, but over an overcast layer. That necessitated an easy LOC Rwy 32 Circle to Land Rwy 5 approach back in to Craig (KCRG). We were out of the clouds and in easy visual contact of the airport just after reaching the final approach fix inbound. We landed and got everything unloaded. Pete took Jerry to Jacksonville International Airport to catch his flight home while I finished securing the plane.

It was truly an awesome trip. Everything went really well and the plane ran great. We met some amazing people and I finally got to do something good with the plane for others and it definitely will not be the last time! We'll see what comes up next. I can't wait!

Over 5 days we traveled over 1300 miles, put 10.5 hours on the plane, helped some great people, and had an awesome time.  Yup, I do thank God for everything!