Our children are too old for Spring Break but I still have a nephew that celebrates the occasion. We wanted to get together over his break but the weather early this week in a word sucked. It was windy, cloudy and rainy. Friday promised better weather, so we made plans to meet in Macon.
My brother would be driving down and we would fly up. We had the better deal, he had a 1:45 drive while we had a 1:05 flight. That said, we left the house at the same time he did. I had checked the plane out Thursday and added oil so when I preflighted today, everything was ready to go. The weather at home was better than forecast with clouds at 4,000' though we avoided them.
The flight up was easy, basically take off, turn 90 degrees left and then go straight. Macon has two runways but 5/23 was closed so we were using 14/32. The wind was variable at 3 and the ATIS was calling for 14 but Atlanta approach gave us the visual to 32. This has you overfly Warner Robins Air Force Base as the runway ends are only about 2 miles apart. I was happy with 32 as the FBO is at the end of 14.
The FBO is in the process of being rebuilt so it currently is in the airline terminal. Arriving we cleared the runway and had a very short taxi to a spot right up front by the door and right next to the TSA restricted area. The linemen make sure you don't cross the red line. So why Macon? There is a cool Airforce Museum next to Warner Robins.
The FBO gets high marks, it's called Highnote. We were marshalled right up front. They had me fueled right away, they had a nice candy dish and when I went in to pay I got a bonus. I was paying for our gas and the Customer Service Rep helping us had been folding T shirts. I mentioned they were cool, they were FBO logo with an F-16 Fighting Falcon on the back professing support for our Airforce. She mentioned they had a spelling error though; and I could have one if I liked.
Of course I got a cool free shirt (don't count what I just spent on gas). The funny thing is that when we were in Pensacola at the Navy museum, we bought some stuff at the store and while checking out we also got free shirts because an order had come in with a spelling error. The funny thing, no one has ever noticed that error. I tested a few people on the new shirt having them read the misspelled text and none caught it. So not only was the shirt free, wearing it has a special sense of satisfaction given how bad a speller I am.
My Brother showed up on time. It was a bit funny being picked up at the commercial terminal, though it's not much of a terminal, more on that later. We went from the airport to lunch to build strength to go look at airplanes. My nephew talked me into Cook Out which was OK but did not live up to his review of its greatness.
After being fed it was time to visit the museum. It is next to Warner Robins and free to visit and free to park. It was not too busy which was nice. The Museum has four display buildings and a bunch of outside displays of larger aircraft. If you have been to the one in Ohio, this one is much, much smaller. It does have a pretty big collection as aviation museums go and given the cost, well worth the stop.
Some of my favorites outside were the C124 Globemaster that CC's Dad had crewed on, a Constellation that had been converted to an electronics plane and a C54 Skymaster which my Dad had flown. Inside they had a good mix of aircraft. In the WW2 section they had a B-29, C-47 and C-46. They had modern planes like the F-15 and Vietnam era favorites like the F-4 and F-105. Too many to mention but we walked around for a few hours until my brother was tuckered out. My nephew seemed to have residual energy.
They then dropped us aback at Macon and headed home. It is really a cute airport. It's like a mini airport with one baggage carousel and one TSA line. The FBO was right next to TSA so we got to walk through the FBO and the line staff let us back out to the plane. Only the red line kept us out of the secure area, that and the likely consequences of crossing the line.
By the time we moved a few feet the engines were warm, it had really heated up from the morning. Run Up was good and soon we were cleared to depart on course and up to 3,000'. The other fun thing about 14 is that we got to go over Warner Robins on the way out which was a cool view. We checked in with departure and had an unrestricted climb to 9,000'. Of course, we had a small headwind on the way up and on the way back but with only 180 miles to go, it was not a big deal.
It was mostly clear on the way back but we did pop through a few clouds and cloud surfed for a bit. Descending for home there was high overcast so we were solid for a few minutes working our way down. The light winds in Macon were gone and replaced by 12-21 mostly down the runway. Had a very satisfying landing and soon had the plane away.
