Catalina
The Jewel In The Ocean

Catalina - the Jewel off the coast of Los Angeles and venue of Trade Winds' annual fly-in. In 1999, Joel and I had ventured down south and had a great time with the other pilots. Last year, Amy, Joel, Silvia, Marcella (Joel's niece) and I had tried to get to Catalina, but the persistent West Coast stratus kept us sitting in Santa Paula wishing for clearer skies over the island airport. No such change was in Mother Nature's near-term plan and we all ended up in Santa Monica for a night and then spent a couple of days in the adorable Danish town of Solvang. To pour salt on the wound, I had a "warm and fuzzy" sweatshirt from Avalon and Amy didn't. Avalon is a popular seaside town on the island, but I'll get there later. Amy had to wait another year.

Departing Reid-Hillview Airport

Reid-Hillview Airport lies just a few miles east of San Jose International and as such, departing IFR can often cause a delay getting off the ground.  For the non-pilots out there, check out my description of IFR and VFR in my Angel Flight entitled "IMC Waves".  Reid was IFR but was rapidly becoming VFR.  Three aircraft were holding on the ground when the airport decided to change runways and depart towards the northwest instead of the southeast.  At this point I could have just departed VFR to the southeast, but instead decided to taxi the length of the runway and proceeded to sit for 15 minutes waiting for my IFR departure.  In all, a very frustrating wait.  Finally, I got my take-off clearance and ATC vectored me about 30 degrees from my intended route.  This is not too unusual in a busy airspace and you finally get a heading on course.  In this case, ATC said: "Join Victor 107" - victor airways are like highways in the sky.  I replied "Uhhh, Victor 107 is not in our clearance."  ATC replied with the unbelievable: "OK, I didn't have any paperwork on you, so I assumed you were headed out that way."  Wow.  This was soon resolved and an hour later we were headed into the San Luis area.

Our destination airport was reporting IFR conditions as we expected.  The stratus had been an issue the whole week and is a known visitor on summer mornings.  The VORs in the Cutlass had not been working for a few weeks and my persistent phone calls to Trade Winds had the Cutlass in the avionics shops and returned to the flight line with operable VORs.  I gave them a good check-out during the flight and all seemed in order until I dialed in the San Luis Obispo ILS frequency.  The localizer came alive, but the glide-slope remained flagged.  In non-pilot lingo, this means that it would give me lateral guidance, but not vertical guidance.  I didn't think too much of it as this often happens when you are far from the localizer.  ATC gave me a slam-dunk approach dropping me in from very high onto the approach and then told me to get down quicker to make the airport and contact the tower.  By this point, I knew the glide-slope was nowhere to be seen and reverted to the localizer approach.  As things turned out I popped through the clouds within a minute and the runway appear before us.  One smooth touchdown later, and Amy, Sleepyhead, and I shutdown the Cutlass in the transient parking area.  I immediately called Bart, but there was no reply on his cell phone.  We tied up and found Bart just having arrived at the airport.

Meeting Bart in San Luis Obispo

Bart Wensink taught me to fly.  When I decided to take up the challenge, Bart drew the short straw by answering my call and setting me up with him for an Introductory Lesson some five years ago.  It wasn't long after getting through a Practical Test with an FAA Designated Examiner and obtaining my Private Pilot Certificate, that I enrolled in the Instrument Ground School and chose Bart to show me the ways of thy Instruments and 'cloud flying'.  Soon after obtaining my Instrument Rating, Bart left for a First Officer job at SkyWest.  I wasn't sure if you could call flying for SkyWest a job, or if he really just wasn't taking the job so that he didn't have to teach me anymore.  Anyway, I digress.  Bart and Lori currently live in San Luis Obispo which is roughly halfway between San Jose and the LA area.  Baby Anneke was recently introduced into the world and is very very cute.  Pilots generally work a few days on and a few days off and it turned out that Bart was not working on the Friday we were headed down to Catalina, so we set up a lunch date.

Bart showed us around their house while Lori finished breast-feeding Anneke and then we headed off to lunch.  There was some Mozart concert in downtown and as a result, all the favorite lunch places were very full.  We were a little rushed as we had arrived a tad late, spent some time looking around the house, and we wanted to get into Catalina soon enough to spend a good few hours before dinner.  We ended up getting a Mongolian style lunch which was very yummy and it sure hit the spot.  I hadn't eaten Mongolian style for ages and chomped it down in fine style.

Catalina Arrival

By lunch time, the clouds had gone away and allowed Joel, Silvia and Marcella to land at the San Luis airport and get a bite to eat.  We met them around 2pm and departed soon thereafter.  The Los Angeles area is a very traffic intensive area.  In addition, Los Angles International (LAX) lies right on the coast thereby making transition of the airspace difficult.  Fortunately, ATC makes three primary routes available.  Today we were to use the Hollywood Park route.  We were offered 9,500' and we took it as this gave us excellent gliding range should the engine decide to quit over the water on our way to the island.  After reaching the shoreline, we started a gentle descent in which the Cutlass really picked up speed.  The Cutlass is a retractable and this cleaner configuration really helps get the speed up there in a descent.  We heard the Trade Winds' Arrow behind us and another airplane inbound from Two Harbors.  It is always a great sight to see Avalon at the one corner of the island and the Airport In The Sky sitting atop a ridge roughly in the center of the island.  Amy was understandably excited given the "almost but no cigar' venture the previous year.  Most non-towered airports have what is known as a Common Traffic Advisory frequency (CTAF) that allows pilots to talk to one another as they approach a non-towered airport.  Catalina is unique in that the airport manager monitors the frequency and acts as a quasi-tower.  I called on the 45 as well as the downwind and turned final behind another Cessna.  The first half of the runway has a 1.7% uphill slope and this gives the pilot the illusion of being too high on final.  I certainly didn't want to allow this to 'fool' me as the runway threshold is preceded by a precipitous drop.  The approach and landing went well.  I tied her up (I'm referring to the Cutlass) and watched Joel land the Archer.  We had arrived and were ready for a great weekend.

Suicidal Bus Ride

Trade Winds had pre-arranged for the airport to waive both the landing and overnight fees, but out came $12 each for roundtrip bus ticket to Avalon.  We met up with numerous other Trade Winds' pilots and were soon boarding the 5pm bus to make the 1600' descent into the quaint seaside town.  I had prepared Amy for the bus-ride; i.e. the most dangerous part of the trip in the bus-ride.  The first half of the 40 minute journey take you laterally across the island whereas the latter half has you descending into town.  The bus ride is very pretty punctuated by the steep cliffs right next to the road.  I was hoping that we didn't have Niki "You picked a fine time to leave me loose wheel" Lauda as our driver for the day.  Some 40 minutes later we were finally climbing off the bus in Avalon.  If was smooth sailing from here.  Just walk one block to the Hermosa Hotel, check-in, go get pizza, and party!  Or so we thought...

Does anyone have a room for us?

Cutting to the chase, the Hermosa would not allow three people in a room and therefore would not allow Joel to check-in.  The girls remained with our bags at the Hermosa while Joel and I walked the town trying to find a room, any room, at any price.  It was wickedly, yet mildly entertaining to watch Joel's approach going from "Do you have any rooms?" to "Look, I'm very desperate and I will pay you anything whatsoever for a room.  Please, please, please..."  Despite the pleas from us and the laughter from them, no room was to be found.  I had the idea of the campsite which sure beat the heck of catching the last ferry at 9:15pm back to the mainland and then trying to find accommodation there.  Joel and I trekked up the hill for 1 mile and managed to organize a tent, sleeping bags and other equipment to at least provide a roof over their heads.  With that done and the $160 paid - the Hermosa only cost $109 - we boarded the $1 shuttle back to town - we had had enough walking for one day.  On the bus were two South Africans who were living in San Diego.  It was fun speaking with them and we must have bonded cause she offered me some of the biltong she was eating.  Now Americans may not understand the magnitude of this offering, but this was not something to be taken lightly.  It pained me to refuse, but it would have pained me more to watch her part with her treasure.

Friday Pizza

With that taken care of, it was time to hit the town.  Rumor had it that the rest of the group were headed to the pizza place and that's where we met the group.  Unlike last time, the group wasn't as cohesive.  Nevertheless, we ordered pizza and consumed that in no time at all.  After dinner, we walked around and checked out the small town.  We found a small shop serving chocolate dipped cone - yummy.  Joel et al left us for their cab ride to the camp ground while Amy and I ventured into our walls of paper, bed of springs, and pillows of acorns 'suite'.  Given the non-existent sound-proofing and the staircase 3 inches from our room, we stayed awake reading until the noise abated to an acceptable level around midnight.  Turns out that the King bed we have at home spoilt little Miss Princess and the double bed just didn't suffice.  Luckily for me, I could handle sleeping on the floor and that's exactly where I spent the night.

Saturday

Amy and I woke up on Saturday morning cursing about our living conditions and then walked across the corridor to the restroom and showers.  This turned out to be luxurious living quarters for when we later bumped into the camping trio getting off the shuttle, the moans, groans, aches, and pains had us laughing on the inside while trying vainly to show sympathy towards the city-slickers.  First things first and off we went to Sally's for the finest waffles in town - actually the only waffles in town.  The line outside moved quickly and soon I was anticipating a Waffle House waffle.  It was not to be, however, the waffle wasn't too bad, somewhat crisp for my liking though.  So, not to be disappointed, I ordered another asking for it to be 'lighter'.  Well, perhaps if we had a microscope and sophisticated instrumentation we may have been able to detect the difference, but I left somewhat unsatisfied as a waffle connoisseur, albeit with a full belly.

From Sally's we walked to the other end of Avalon to check out the Casino.  The history of the Casino is unknown to me, but they have tours and on this weekend, were showing Tomb Raider starring the babe with the digitally removed tattoo.  Joel and I noticed the steps leading down to the ocean for the SCUBA divers and remembered back, on our previous visit, to our attempt to non-chalantly climb out of the ocean on the slippery rocks with all the gear tightly strapped on.   I was dumfounded when I heard a woman say "It must be really difficult to walk up those stairs with the flippers on."  Little did she know.  Just another hundred yards further along the seaside lay Descanso Beach.  We sat ourselves down for some virgin drinks (apart from Silvia who enjoyed every minute of island life) and the mandatory buffalo wings which did a mediocre job of hitting the spot.

Energy Runs Out

By this time Joel was itching to get into the water for some snorkeling.  However, for whatever reason - probably the sun - I was feeling pooped.  Joel wanted to go snorkeling, the girls wanted to go shopping, and I wanted to go up to the room and relax with a book for an hour.  Back to the Hermosa and up to the third floor for Navy Seal Joel to get his equipment and the girls to freshen up for their spending spree.  I opened my magazine and before I could read more than a paragraph or two, I heard a choir of snoring coming from all corners of the room.  It was hilarious.  I guess camp life took its toll, but within the space of three minutes, the highly adventurous group was atrophied to a bunch of dead wood.  Amy and I decided to leave the sleeping not-so-beauties and go for a walk.  I am disgusted to report that I succumbed to eating a few KFC chicken strips.  We sat around talking for a while and then popped back upstairs.  Finally, they awoke and the girls were still (always?) in a shopping mood.  So off they went while I caught up on my reading.  After I had enjoyed my quiet time, I braced myself for the news of credit card usage.  Actually, it wasn't too bad and somewhere in the pile of clothes, there was something for me - Amy's so cute.

I think we need a recount

Not like I'm sexist or anything, but come on, guys can beat girls at practically any sport.  It wasn't even going to be a contest, but fine, we decided to humor the girls and challenge them - ha ha - to a game of miniature golf.  Given that there were two guys and three girls, somehow we came up with the idea of discarding the highest score on each hole from the girls' team.  Sure, whatever - still not even worth getting up a sweat.  The strategic ball colors were picked, we headed for the first hole.  With threes and fours coming from the boys' team and fives and sixes coming from the girls', Joel and I strode comfortably around the 18-hole course.  Sure, the girls played a few good holes, but shock, horror when the putts were putted and the scores totaled, the girls had won by two strokes.  This was inconceivable and sets the stage for a fierce, unrelenting battle to the death next year when the titans shall clash once again.

Dinner and Karaoke

I had bumped into a fellow pilot Frank earlier and he told me about a group dinner at the karaoke bar.  About thirty of us huddled around a long table and ate our meal.  As we were finishing up, a Martina Navratilova look-a-like anted-up with the first song and acted as organizer and soon-to-be policeman.  After some bouncy girls did their best to massacre a song and one guy thought he was Frank Sanatra, I decided it was time to volunteer Frank to sing.  When his name was called, Frank looked surprised but almost willing to embarrass himself.  Unfortunately, Martina acted as though someone had stolen her racket and balls and reprimanded the crowd for trying to embarrass someone.  Hello!  Earth to dumb woman!  This was Karaoke for heaven sake!  Enough of this nonsense - we headed outside.  Amy, Joel, Silvia, and Marcella fed their faces with ice-cream in a waffle cone.  Most of the pilot crowd had decided to go watch flying fish - quite unlike the Seattle version - which entailed venturing yonder on a boat.  Summer, Saturday Night, popular activity...  See where I'm going with this.   A few minutes later the crowd was headed to the local hot chocolate stand to drown their sorrows of a full boat.  We had decided not to go watch flying fish in case the occasional bout of dizziness Amy was experiencing made the ride uncomfortable - once you're on the boat, you're on the boat - a perfect place to have a party!  :)  We were flying out earlyish and decided to give Luau Larry's a miss this time.  Once again, the 'naturists' headed up the hill for their bed of stone.

The Quest for the Perfect Waffle

Believe it or not, Sally's was the breakfast of choice.  Now remember back just 24 hours in the trip and my thoroughly disappointment of the waffle 'lightness'?  Well, never fear, here I was once again braving reality.  We ordered one "super-duper ultra light, almost raw".  It was done just right.  Still, not nearly as good as the Waffle House, but getting closer.  With our belly's satisfied, we walked around for a few minutes, then checked out of the hotel and headed to the bus stop for the trek back up the hill.

Leaving Catalina

The ride back was just as adventurous, but this time we saw many of the buffalo which roam the island including some of the little ones.  Due to aircraft weight considerations, Joel planned to stop in Santa Monica for fuel and then we were to meet up at Oceana - an airport to which neither of us had ever landed.  Joel picked up the weather via the Flight Service Station (FSS) while I called and spoke directly with Oceana's airport manager - gotta love the smaller airports.  The weather was a non-issue apart from some lingering stratus around the Oceana area.  The departure was normal and we extended our upwind leg to take in the gorgeous sights of the Two Harbors area - it really is a beautiful island.  This wide loop also gave us time to gain altitude before venturing back across the Pacific.  We settled in at 6,500' for a few minutes.  Then when ATC seemed very busy, we dropped back down to 4,500' to remain below LAX's class Bravo airspace.  I tried to call ATC for the Shoreline route, but she told me to use the Special Flight Rules Area (SFRA).  The SFRA is a corridor directly over LAX allowing aircraft to fly both northwest and southeast at 4,500' and 3,500' respectively without talking with ATC.  Things sure got a little busy and Amy's help was enormous.  Amy read out the SFRA radials, frequencies, altitudes etc while I kept a lookout in the busy airspace.  I had read-up about the SFRA prior to the flight, so things went smoothly.  On the other side of LAX, things became more routine and we settled down for the direct flight to Oceana.

Oceana

The persistent stratus remain around the airport, most of the area was VFR.  We popped under the stratus on our approach and landed at the small airport.  With jeans donned and camera in hand, we set out to visit the small town.  The airport is a well-known camping spot and the tents were lined up on the grass which I'm sure provided a softer floor than the Catalina camp ground.  We met up with some friendly folk on the airport grounds and asked them the way to a restaurant.  They pointed us to the Rock 'n Roll Diner, and also showed us the bikes available for pilots.  Cool!  We hopped on the bikes and rode up the short gentle hill to the Rock 'n Roll Diner.  The restaurant is housed in two railway coaches and has the genuine 1950s kinda feel to it.  The food was very good - I had a BBQ beef sandwich made on their very own grill outside.  As we were leaving the restaurant on our bikes to go visit the ocean, my cell phone rang - the rest of the gang had just arrived.  So back down the hill to the airport - we're talking 1/4 mile.  After chatting about flying stuff with regards the LA area, Joel and Jill went up the hill to the diner and Amy and I headed off to the beach.  They have All Terrain Vehicles (ATV) for rent, but today didn't provide enough time - next time.  The beaches in the area are high activity beaches and this is the place to come for a weekend of energetic fun.  We arrived back at the restaurant as the others were finishing up.  At this point, our plans diverged.  Amy and I were going to fly to Harris Ranch to pick up some meat and marinade, while Joel was going to head home.  After pumping a bunch of 100 low-lead gas into the Cutlass and convincing Amy to change into shorts, we departed the pretty ocean town.

Harris Ranch

Our departure route took us past San Luis Obispo, home of Bart, but there was no stopping this time.  Forty-five minutes later we were in the traffic pattern at Harris Ranch watching a Citabria taking off the wrong way for the wind direction and we were communicating with an inbound SkyMaster.  We touched down gently on the 30' wide runway - the Cutlass wingspan is 36'!  Immediately, we were greeted with 90+F heat.  We tied down and walked into the very welcome air-conditioned restaurant.  Three fillets, one marinated tri-tip, four bottles of marinate, three sodas, and some candy later and we were happy campers.  At this point I decided to run back to the plane and grab my video camera.  It was a short walk to the hotel and as usual, the sun was shining and the birds were singing.  The hotel and pool area really is an oasis in the desert.  We departed to the northwest and started our final leg back to Reid-Hillview.

Honey, we're home!

The flight home was uneventful - I flew while Amy read.  We tied down, unpacked all the flying and eating stuff and walked back to the car.

We finally made it to Catalina.  During her shopping spree, Amy had satisfied her shopping craving by buying a warm-and-fuzzy sweatshirt.  The planes performed flawlessly (apart from the minor glide-slope issue), the flights were smooth, and we accomplished everything we set out to do - it really couldn't have gone a whole lot better.  We got lots of video, and Joel's camera captured some good pictures, some of which you see here.

I think it's safe to say that we're planning on heading back next year, although Joel might decide on changing sleeping venues.

- - - The End - - -

Click on image to view full size image

Sally's Waffle Shop

Sally provided us with our morning breakfast consisting of waffles and other unimportant food groups.  Not exactly sure why, but they closed at 1pm, so we had to get there ASAP to get our morning fix.

Joel's Waffle

Those of you who read the story of our Seattle adventure may be able to equate the sheer size of Joel's waffle with the crepe served at the Market in Seattle.

Testing the waffle for quality.

Clearly this is something I do not enjoy, but with the support of my friends, I managed to get through the ordeal.

The group.

This picture was taken on the west side of the Casino looking out towards the private beach at which we devoured the buffalo wings.

Girls gone crazy, errr, shopping...

While I relaxed in the room reading a magazine, the credit cards were leaving trails of steam.  Here the girls show off their spoils.

The Casino.

This gorgeous view was snapped during the early hours of the mornings showing the numerous boats with a Casino as a backdrop.

The town of Avalon.

Shopping, eating, and drinking - not much else to do in Avalon, but that'll keep you busy and very happy for several days.

Gimme that money!

Joel trying vainly to evade this jobless stranger.

Hugging at dinner time.

Finally making it to Catalina deserved at least a hug.  We were happy to be on the island with friends and each other and having a great time too.

Waffle cone ice-creams.

Look who's not in the picture.  Yip, my body is a temple - thy shall not feed it ice-cream - waffles are OK though.

The majority of the fly-in group.

Most of these guys were planning on heading out to view the flying fish.  By the time they came to understand the concept of reservations, it was too late and hot chocolate drinks were used to drown the sorrows of the avid sailors.

The arches in Avalon.

Yet another of my "dunno what this, but it looks cool" pictures.

The ferry.

The speedy ferry with the Casino in the background.

Joel with his 'wheels'.

After getting the Archer some gas in Santa Monica, Joel met up with us in Oceana.

Lance Armstrong and Amy.

We headed down from the Diner to meet the new arrivals and show off our bicycle skills.  We managed to dodge all the airplanes on the ramp.

The Rock 'n Roll Diner.

A great picture by Joel of restaurant.  The food was great too and I would be a regular if I lived in Oceana.

The hi-tech stereo.

Amy put in a quarter and selected two fun songs.  Somehow, part of me wishes I lived in that era.  You know, fun, funny clothes, greasy hair, and no stock options to have sleepless night over.

The BBQ outside.

This is why the food tasted so good, and the area smelled so good.

Gassin' up.

Didn't want to run on fumes.  We still had a bunch of gas in the tank, but definitely needed a whole lot more to get us to Harris Ranch and on the Reid-Hillview.  This self-serve 'drive-thru' is typical of many non-towered airports.  Some things to note about the airplane: 3-blade prop, and holes in the fuselage into which the wheels retract.