Cotton Candy Sunrises

Reconnecting with my inner wanderlust after a year and a half at home

- AMY LABODA

It’s 5 a.m. and my eyes are open. I tap the screen of my phone, strategically poised on my nightstand and ready to wake me in 15 minutes. I don’t need its alarm. I know today is the day I have planned to actually go somewhere on my airplane. I fueled, pre-flighted, and loaded the RV-10 last night before sunset, making sure I tucked a couple of extra quarts of oil, the toolkit, and a spare part or two (ever try to get an alternator in rural Idaho?) in with the two gallons of water, sleeping bags, backpacking tent, and first-aid/emergency kit. Everything has its place, ensuring proper weight and balance, all cargo secured, so no jostling in turbulence. Our soft-sided duffels seem diminutive compared to the “insurance” equipment we carry on a long cross-country. We can always wash clothes.

Last night, before my head hit my pillow, I’d updated all my flight planning software, even the backup on my phone, and left the tablet on its charger. A software developer once told me he flew with three tablets at the ready, and I took that advice to heart. I’ve seen an iPad overheat and shut itself down at a most inconvenient moment. Even with the ability to program my routes and IFRapproaches into my EFIS, I still carry backup devices. More than 40 years of flying have taught me: avionics break in flight. Just before I drifted off to sleep, I contemplated our route: a roughly diagonal slash across the heartland and hopefully around the highest terrain in the Lower 48. I’ve been watching the weather for a week now, even studying detailed lifted index charts that glider pilots and meteorologists cherish; the first looking for free rides aloft, the second attempting to predict tomorrow’s riskiest air masses. It isn’t a straight line.