Back to the Northwest

After a very quick day home, I was back on the road back to the great north to pick up a passenger. Being home for that time allowed me to do some laundry, and that’s about it.

When I showed up at the hangar early last Tuesday morning, Gladys was just as excited to be back on the road. Doesn’t she look good in the early-morning sun?

I’m always amazed at what a small world it can be in aviation. Like always happens when I’m near this airplane at any airport, people want to poke their heads inside to take a look. Phenom 300s are rare, and pilots get jealous. I’ll leave it at that.

This particular gentleman came over to look. We got to talking and realized that he served his mission in Poland with Hubby’s brother. This guy has lived all over the world flying really big airplanes, and I just so happen to run into him on the ramp while waiting to depart. It was cool to hear some of his experiences, and also to show him Gladys. James says hello, Steve!

What a small world!

It was a quick taxi to depart on Runway 21. Have I mentioned how wonderful it is to be based at this airport? They let corporate jets take priority and treat us so well. After being based at the main airline airport for five years at Sky Harbor, it’s nice to get such special treatment.

Jet Suite flies into Scottsdale now, for any of your chartering needs!

And there are always pretty airplanes on the ramps that we pass. Hi, Citation!

Soon, we were in the air and headed back towards the Seattle area. I never mind leaving the triple-digit heat! Goodbye, Phoenix! Cool off before I come home in two weeks, please.

Look at that! We flew right over the Grand Canyon again! It was prettier a few days before with all of the sunset lighting.

I love little puffy clouds. They look better from above, though.

Our condensed version of our checklist seemed to have found a new home after our maintenance a few weeks ago, so we have been using the big ol’ honkin’ one until I have time to make a new, smaller version that will fit on the yoke. This thing is huge and cumbersome to use for all of our checklist needs. I would rather tuck this big thing away into the side panel pocket while using a small version that is attached to the yoke right in front of me.

The crazy thing is that I will be flying so much over the next few weeks that I probably won’t have time to design a new checklist!

Isn’t this going to be fun?!

We are already starting our descent from Flight Level 430 down to 24,000 feet. We were going about 440 knots true airspeed at that altitude! Man, this girl flies!

Holy cow! Here we are at Mount Rainier again! Part of the arrival into the Seattle area takes us right next to this beautiful giant. We are direct to RATTY here before getting to turn west towards Bremerton.

It makes it easier for the Seattle controllers to handle so many busy airports in this airspace. I feel for them. It gets crazy here!

And we made it! For some strange reason, I have absolutely no pictures from RATTY to Bremerton. But with a nice, foggy layer all morning, the traffic pattern was nice and quiet for our arrival.

The ceiling came up to 1,200 feet from 200 overcast just an hour before we arrived. It’s nice to have higher clouds so that we could see the airport! We broke out of the clouds about three miles out and continued visually to land.

And then we grabbed some fuel so we could leave again just a few minutes later. Man, I love my job.