Saturday, August 18, 2018 Cobra flight #647, PIC #657, 3 landings Acoma, Malpais, Ramah Lake, Mystic Bluffs, Bandara Crater.

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1 Saturday, August 18, 2018 Cobra flight #647, PIC #657, 3 landings Acoma, Malpais, Ramah Lake, Mystic Bluffs, Bandara Crater. Belen: 5:53 am Mystic Bluffs: 8:08 am Mystic Bluffs: 9:37 Belen: 11:04 am Airtime: 3.7 Total PIC Time: Total Logged Time: Today is the Mystic Bluffs Fly-in, near Ramah Lake. I have wanted to go to this breakfast fly-in for years, but have been stymied by high winds, non-flyable trikes, and other difficulties. Paul and I are meeting Henry enroute near Acoma, then we will fly together into Mystic Bluffs. There will be mph winds in the late morning so we went for a civil twilight take off to get there early.

2 I climbed up high for the initial part of the flight. I did not want to worry about any invisible powerlines this morning. Above, I am over the Amber Hills area. That s Ladron Peak in the background.

3 I watched the sun slowly rise in the east. It was spectacular.

4 I made several 360 circles just to look at the beautiful morning skyline. Here I am looking north to Mt Taylor.

5 I made it to Petoch Butte just as it was glowing in the morning light. I looped around the back, spiraling up and over the top.

6 A minute after I captured this video frame, the sun became obscured by clouds on the eastern horizon and the butte went dark. Lucky timing for me.

7 I flew through the canyon to Acoma with the goblins watching from the side.

8 We picked up Henry near Petoch Butte and we took him south down to the Acoma Needle.

9 I left the needle and flew over this weird little mesa south of Acoma.

10 I flew south of the pueblo and checked out this crazy patch of rocks and spires.

11 We crossed through the gap to the Malpais. Then over to the ruins on the mesa that overlook the lava fields.

12 I headed south and circled a sandstone spire called La Vieja (the old woman) at the edge of the lava field.

13 Then over to La Ventana Arch.

14 It was time to cross the Malpais. There was a strange band of low clouds drifting in from the south.

15 The clouds were over the Hole on the Wall, a clearing at the center of the Malpais. It is an old outlaw hide out.

16 After leaving the lava fields, we flew over a pine forest, with some small volcanos here and there.

17 We flew over El Morro, an old watering hole and Indian ruin.

18 We were getting close to Mystic Bluff now so we switched our radios to I could here some activity ahead. Planes were landing to the east. So I diverted to the left so we could overfly Ramah Lake on our way into the Mystic Bluffs airstrip. After flying past the edge of the water I saw plane landing ahead of us.

19 Up ahead was a hot air balloon and a dozen planes on the ground. The ones near the balloon had camped overnight. A week ago I was tempted to make an overnighter out of this trip, but I didn t want to deal with the violent afternoon and evening thunderstorms were had been having. On this trike trip we would land, eat, and head home. I heard later there were approximately 50 aircraft had dropped in over the weekend. I overflew the airstrip, passing over the plane taxing up the runway, then entered left traffic to circle the strip and let the plane clear the runway.

20 Landing at Mystic Bluffs. They deflated the balloon shortly after I landed.

21 We got a great parking spot, close to the food tent (behind my trike, background). The breakfast was unbelievable, breakfast burritos, blueberry waffles and cream, ham cheese and egg casserole, egg sausage green chile casserole, sweet rolls, orange juice. I was stuffed.

22 After an hour, we started to extract ourselves from breakfast. I took off first, lifting off right in front of the food tent.

23 I went around the pattern once, to give Paul and Henry a chance to get going. In this shot I count 32 planes on the ground. That plus our 3 trikes makes 35 aircraft. I heard a couple enter the pattern on the radio after we departed and saw a few leave while we were on the ground, so 50 aircraft sounds reasonable.

24 I headed west to fly out over Ramah Lake.

25 We overflew Bandara Crater on the way home. At this point Henry split off to head to Double Eagle.

26 I was very high, over 9000 ft when I overflew Acoma Pueblo on the way home.

27 All in all, this was a great flight and breakfast. Here is my GPS track. Mt Taylor Plateau Petoch Butte Acoma Belen Bandera Crater Malpais Hole in the Wall Mystic Bluffs El Morro Ramah Lake