Wickenburg, AZ to Placerville, CA – Day 1

Posted on by
Comment

Foiled by wind.

I planned the trip for hours. That’s the truth. I knew I was going to go on a helicopter trip, but I didn’t know where I was going. It wasn’t until Friday, when I met Rod’s friend Nick, that I decided. I’d go to Placerville, to visit Liz and Rod. But it wasn’t until Sunday that I started planning a route.

The trouble with getting to Placerville from Wickenburg is the Sierra Nevada mountain range. There aren’t many places to cross it without climbing to altitudes that would cause Three-Niner-Lima to vibrate to pieces. (Three-Niner-Lima starts vibrating at 8500 feet.) I finally decided on the Tehachapi Pass, northwest of Palmdale. I then listed all the airports along the way, noting which ones had fuel (all of them) and restaurants (few of them). I marked up a WAC. And then I packed.

I got off to a late start on Monday morning. I’d hoped to leave by 8 AM; I took off at 9. I’d filed a flight plan to Apple Valley via Twentynine Palms. It was an ambitious flight plan. I’d have to fly direct at an average about 90 knots ground speed.

Flying direct was new for me. I have a tendency to follow roads when I fly and to look for mountain passes when I have to cross mountain ranges. Things worked out well for me at the start of this trip. I headed almost due west, over Forepaugh, and north of Eagle Roost. Then through Cunningham Pass, and over the Cactus Plains to the Colorado River, south of Parker. The terrain was boring, water-scarred desert, broken by mountains thrust out of the desert floor. To someone from the east or north or midwest, the terrain would be fascinating. But when you’ve flown over it as many times as I have, it loses its charm.

The Colorado River wound through the desert, a dark blue ribbon cutting across the dust and rock. Beyond it, the desert floor was flat, sloping gently back toward the river, scarred with thousands of tiny washes. I imagined the scene before me during a rainstorm, when water flowed in every single channel. I crossed over a VOR and followed a road and a line of train tracks. The track ballast consisted of light and dark colored stones. I caught sight of a name written alongside the tracks in carefully arranged stones. Then another and another. I soon realized that there were hundreds of names, all neatly written in stone in the middle of nowhere. I circled to take a picture. At least this was something interesting.

Photo
This photo doesn’t do the site justice; the names in stone went on for at least a mile.

Monitoring my progress on the Los Angeles Sectional chart now, I crossed over what had once been the town of Rice. It was a railroad junction where a few train cars waited on a siding. There were building ruins, including a stone building that still had one full wall standing. Lots of debris and trash. I continued on my course, almost due west, and passed south of Iron Mountain, with it single north/south runway. Nothing going on there.

Rocky hills and mountains rose from the desert floor. My path took me beside several of them. I joined up again with the road I’d left at Rice. It formed the northern border of Joshua Tree National Park. I stayed north of the road, flying about 300 feet AGL, admiring the stark rocks of the Coxcomb Mountains to the south. I climbed with the terrain, reaching an altitude of almost 3000 feet.

Joshua Tree
The landscape just northeast of the northern edge of Joshua Tree National Park.

Throughout the flight, I’d managed to maintain an airspeed that varied from 85 knots to 95 knots, with a similar ground speed. Still, flying at nearly full power with carb heat on, I was burning fuel at a higher rate than I’d expected. As Dale Lake (mostly dry) and the Twentynine Palms VOR came into view, I realized that I would not make it to Apple Valley. I made my first call to Twentynine Palms while I was ten miles out. No response. An airplane called in when I was about five miles out. He didn’t get any response either. He said he was heading toward Hi Desert, the next airport on my path, about 15 miles further along. I asked if there was fuel at Hi Desert — the chart said there was, but you never know — and he told me there was. I decided to go there instead. At least I knew there would be someone there.

Dale Lake
Dale Lake did have some water in it. But not much.

I passed Twentynine Palms airport just to the north of its runways. The field looked to be in good condition and I could see a big Chevron sign by the fuel pumps. About a half dozen planes were parked on the ramp. But there was no sign of life. I kept flying.

I overflew the rather large town of Twentynine Palms. Between Hi Desert and me was a mesa; I decided to fly around it, to the south. Meanwhile, the plane, a Cherokee, was getting closer to Hi Desert. Although I expected him to beat me in, he was still 5 miles out when I had the airport in sight. It wasn’t much to look at. I overflew it to check the wind, reported my findings to the Cherokee, and made a spiral landing down to the fuel pumps. It was about 11 AM.

Hi Desert is an airpark, something that isn’t obvious when you consult a sectional chart for information. It had one runway, which was in pretty good shape, and a handful of Mexican style adobe buildings on the southeast end of the runway. It looked as if it had once been a very nice place, but had since been neglected, probably because no one was around to admire it. I was shutting down when the Cherokee landed. The pilot appeared from behind some buildings when I was looking for a bathroom. Although the sign on the FBO door said it was open from 8 AM to 5 PM, everything was locked up tight.

The Cherokee pilot pointed out a bathroom that appeared to have been added as an afterthought to a shed. It was bright, but reminded me of the kind of rest room you’d find at a very old gas station. Not exactly dirty, but certainly not clean. There was toilet paper, but no paper towel. The Cherokee pilot helped me with the fuel hose, then spent some time looking at my helicopter while I fueled it. We chatted about the place. I told him that my husband and I were looking for a place like that. He told me it was for sale. I told him we weren’t interested in living in California. He told me he couldn’t blame us. Then a friend of his walked up and they started talking about other things. I finished up and put away the hose and static line, which was hopelessly tangled. I checked the oil, warned them to stand back, then climbed aboard and started up. It was about 11:20 AM. It wasn’t until the blades were spinning that I realized I’d forgotten to take a picture. It would have made an interesting shot.

I waved goodbye and climbed out, continuing toward Apple Valley. My course was now slightly northwest. Twentynine Palms and Hi Desert are just south of a bunch of restricted areas, which is why I had to remain so far south. Now I was flying across the high desert, with terrain roughly 2500 to 3500 feet. And the wind had kicked up. As I flew on the north side of the San Bernadino Mountains, I realized I was hitting headwinds of 20 to 30 knots. In the somewhat gusty conditions, it was tough to maintain an airspeed of 95 without getting dangerously close to my never exceed speed of 102 when the wind gusted, so I let it slip to 90. That gave me ground speeds in the 60s. As I flew along the road at Lucerne Valley, I realized that some of the cars were passing me. I dropped altitude in an attempt to stay out of the worst of the wind, but that didn’t seem to help at all. I was very glad I’d fueled at Hi Desert; I never would have made it to Apple Valley.

Meanwhile, the terrain wasn’t being as cooperative along my course. A mountain separated me from Apple Valley. Again, I skirted along the southern end of it, slipping through a pass about 5 miles southeast of the airport. There was a Decathalon in the pattern there; a Citation had landed when I was still 15 miles out. The airport was large and looked brand new, although there didn’t seem to be many planes on the ramp. I announced that I was transitioning but would remain east and then north of the runways. Someone with the Decathalon pilot — an instructor, perhaps? — thanked me. I continued on, heading into the wind, toward Victorville.

Victorville, or Southern California Logistics, is a controlled airport used primarily by the military. The AWOS was on a frequency that my radio couldn’t get. So I tuned into the tower while I was about 8 miles out and told them I wanted to transition westbound. “Transition approved,” was the reply I got. Simple as that. As I approached the airport, I realized that it was huge and full of parked airliners. Most of them wore United paint jobs, but I did notice one for Tower Air. An army helicopter was making excruciatingly slow approaches to the end of the runway. All around the airport were buildings and the ruins of buildings. I assume this had once been a big air force base that was no longer needed. The radio was quiet. When I was a mile out, I reminded the tower that I’d be flying over. He acknowledged my call with a simple, “Roger.” I punched L00 for Rosamond into my GPS. According to my research, Rosamond had fuel and a restaurant. It would make a good next stop, someplace where I could reassess my route over the mountains. I headed northwest, crossing more high desert. Below me were scattered ruins of stone walls and foundations. As I approached the southern edge of the restricted area around Edwards Air Force Base, I could clearly see Rogers Lake and the buildings of Edwards. I followed a paved road due west for a while, flying over a few homes, most of which were manufactured. My route took me far to the north of Palmdale and far enough to the north of General Fox, so I didn’t need to talk to either of these controlled airports.

Meanwhile, I realized that I was getting kind of sick. Like airsick. The problem was, the wind was gusty and the helicopter was doing a lot of bobbing around. Every time I consulted the chart to see exactly where I was — a GPS is nice, but situational awareness is important — I’d look up to find myself facing another direction. I’d correct my course, bounce up and down a few times, then check the map again. It was uncomfortable flying. And up ahead, I could see where the high valley I was in ended, with the windmills of Tehachapi pass. I’d been warned about the wind in the pass and had a feeling it would be worse than where I was now.

I crossed Rosamond Lake (mostly dry) and saw ripples on the water. Then I saw something that took me a while to figure out. It was a dark object, moving across the surface of the water, leaving dusty water behind it. At first, I thought it was a swimming animal. But the shape was all wrong. I realized then that it was a tumbleweed, being blown across the lake surface. We’re talking serious wind.

Rosamond Airport was beyond the town and it took a while to find it. I made a few calls in and didn’t hear any response. I overflew the field and saw windsocks flying straight out with a cross wind. I made right traffic to Runaway 25. As I was landing, I saw two people watching me. That’s when I realized that Rosamond was an airpark, too.

I set down by the pumps and shut down. There was nothing going on. The FBO office looked closed. The wind was howling.

A man stood by the FBO office. He told me he’d been listening on the radio and was very surprised to hear a helicopter coming in. He confirmed what I’d already suspected: that the restaurant was closed. He told me I could use his phone to call flight service about the weather. Feeling a bit dazed after almost two hours of bouncing around in the air, I followed him. He took me to his home, where his wife was waiting. They gave me the phone and waited while I called Flight Service. I was on hold a long time. When I got a briefer, he gave me the bad news. Winds of 30 gusting to 41 up in the mountain passes. Clouds building. The wind would calm by 7 PM, but there would be clouds in the valley in the morning.

One thing was clear: I wouldn’t be flying over the mountains that day.

I went back to the helicopter, filled it with fuel, and moved it into a parking spot. Moving it wasn’t easy; although I’d brought the ground handling wheels with me, they were underinflated. I tied down the blades and was removing my luggage when my new friend reappeared. He brought me back to his house, where his wife offered to let me stay there. That was weird, but what was weirder was that they were leaving, going back to their primary home in Los Angeles. They were offering to let me stay alone in their house. I thanked them, but said no.

So they brought me into town, where I starting to think I’d made a bad decision about staying at all. There was nothing going on in town — in fact, there wasn’t even much of a town. They drove me around for a while, then stopped at the Devonshire Motel, which one of their neighbors had recommended. I thanked them again, then climbed out with my luggage to get a room.

Inside the motel office, the desk clerk was struggling to get a fax machine working. She said the machine showed an empty paper message and kept trying to close the top of the machine without properly loading the paper. A man, who was waiting to receive a fax, was talking to someone on his cell phone. When it became obvious that it wasn’t going to work, he thanked her and left.

I got a room and the phone number for the local cab company, Dial-a-Ride. My room was on the second floor of the two-story building, just at the top of the stairs. It was clean, but otherwise unremarkable. I used my cell phone to call Mike and report where I was and why I’d stopped for the day. Then I called Liz and Rod and left a message with them.

I tried calling the cab company, but the phone was busy.

I walked to a Mexican place I’d seen nearby and had some lunch. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t anything to write home about. I walked back to my room. By this time, it was about 2 PM. I had an entire day to kill, but there wasn’t anything within walking distance of my motel to do. The town seemed to consist of a handful of schools, fast food joints, and a strip mall with a supermarket, pharmacy, and other necessities of life. There was no quaint town to walk through, no museum, no points of interest.

I spent the afternoon watching TV and starting this blog. And I called the cab company over and over. The phone was always busy.

Liz called to see where I was. She’d misheard me on the phone and thought I was near Santa Rosa, which she knew was pretty much impossible. I filled her in. Later, Mike called. I filled him in. Even later, Rod called. I filled him in, too.

At about 7 PM, I walked next door to the Fosters Freeze, an ice cream/burger chain in California. I bought a hot fudge sundae (so much for the diet). I tried to buy a souvenir tee shirt for Mike, but they didn’t have his size. I went back to the room, listened to the busy signal when I called the cab company, and watched Stargate reruns. By 9 PM, I was asleep.

Flashback: September 1, 2002

Posted on by
Comment

The hidden cabins of the Weaver Mountains.

Richard’s story emerged over lunch at a local restaurant. I don’t even know how it came up in the conversation.

Years ago, he and his stepfather had gone on a four-day hike in the desert, looking for lost treasure. They’d followed old mining roads and pack trails high up into the Weaver Mountains, following vague directions given to them by an old miner who had recently gone to that great mother lode in the sky. As days wore on, they found one landmark after another. On the third morning, they were searching for their last landmark, some cabins deep in a thickly treed canyon. Although they couldn’t see any sign of the cabins from a ridge overlooking miles of high desert terrain, later that day they stumbled upon them while following a spring-fed creek. By then, they were out of time and had to start on their way back home. They never went back.

Richard’s tale of a four-day hike in the desert, living off the land and finding old buildings hidden away in canyons, fascinated me. I’d done my share of exploring when I was in my teens and had some interesting tales to tell. But none could come close to his. I wanted to know more, to see the cabins with my own eyes. Perhaps I thought it was a way to recapture part of my youth, when the simple pleasure of discovery was all the reward I needed after a long hike on a hot day.

But although Richard wanted very much to find the site again, a work-related injury made a long hike or horseback ride impossible. And Richard was certain that there were no roads anywhere near the canyon, so a Jeep wouldn’t get us there. Besides, with thousands of acres of mountainous terrain and numerous canyons with spring-fed creeks, locating the site would be like finding a cactus spine in a patch of tumbleweed. After all, Richard’s initial visit had been long before the era of GPS and he wasn’t sure where the site was.

I can’t recall if it were Richard or me who suggested the helicopter as a means to find his hidden cabins. If Richard suggested it, I’d probably been thinking about it quietly already, so his suggestion seemed perfectly natural. If I suggested it, I don’t recall him being surprised, so he must have been thinking about it, too.

Three-Niner-Lima, as I call my helicopter, is a 1999 Robinson R22 Beta II. I’ve owned it since October 2000 and have done most of my flying at its controls. I learned to fly late in life, earning my private pilot helicopter rating shortly before my 39th birthday and my commercial rating a year and a half later. Three-Niner-Lima seats two, including the pilot. Although it doesn’t have much power — a fact that becomes apparent at higher elevations, especially on warm days — it’s fun and relatively inexpensive to fly.

Richard, his wife Christal, and I met again over breakfast the next day. I brought along some topographic maps. Richard pointed out where he and his stepfather had parked the car for their hike and where he thought they’d hiked. He pointed out a few canyons with springs that could be the canyon they’d visited. I saw a number of 4WD roads and pack trails on the map and pointed them out. Richard repeated with certainty that there were no roads leading into the canyon.

There was a lot of mountainous terrain to cover. When flying helicopters, mountains mean three things: high elevation, which limits available power; unusual winds, which can make landing difficult or hazardous; and uneven terrain, which makes it hard to find an emergency landing area in the unlikely event of an engine failure. With all this in mind, I suggested that we begin our search early in the morning, before the temperature rises and the winds kick up. We agreed to meet at 6:00 AM.

One thing led to another and I was unable to keep our appointment. So we put it off a few days. Thus, it was by chance that we made our flight thirty years to the day of Richard’s original hike — a fact Richard didn’t realize until much later.

The morning of our flight was clear, cool, and calm. We took off from Wickenburg, heading north, just after sunrise. Although Three-Niner-Lima was equipped with a panel-mounted GPS, I brought along my hand-held Garmin, which has mapping capabilities, and set it up to log our route. Later, I was able to overlay the route on some topographic maps, which gave us an interesting view of our flight.

We climbed over the Weaver Mountains in the early morning light. It was slightly hazy that September morning, as if the desert were trying to send its moisture up to the sky to start monsoonal rains as early as possible. But because the summer had been so dry, the desert was a parched beige color, with dusty green patches of vegetation. Up in the Weavers, however, it was obvious where springs flowed. Dozens of canyons were green with tall cottonwoods and other water-loving trees of the desert. It was under one of those canopies of trees that we’d find the hidden cabins.

We flew a relatively standard search-and-rescue pattern, weaving back and forth over one canyon after another. For safety’s sake, I needed to remain at least 500 feet up. Since we were operating in an area of rapidly changing elevations, I kept my eyes outside the cockpit, concentrating on keeping us clear of terrain. I did my best to place the best view on the left side of the cockpit, where Richard sat, scanning the ground.

After about 40 minutes of searching, we were getting discouraged. I felt bad for Richard, who had come prepared with hiking shoes, water pack, and camera, ready to relive a thirty-year-old experience. He clearly expected us to land somewhere and it had gotten to the point where he didn’t really care where. We talked about finding a landing zone near one of the more densely vegetated canyons and I saw a spot that might work. After doing a high reconnaissance, I told him I’d try an approach, but warned that if the site didn’t look smooth or level, I’d have to break it off.

I went in cautiously, my eyes on the proposed landing zone, an arm of the mountain that seemed flat and clear. I was about 100 feet from the ground when Richard called out suddenly, “There it is!” I tore my eyes from the landing zone for a quick look and saw the weathered roof of a cabin among the trees. A moment later, I touched down on level ground on a high point near the canyon, surrounded by prickly pear cacti, agaves, and scrubby creosote bushes.

Richard and I were both excited as I cooled off the engine and shut down. I marked my helicopter’s location as a waypoint on my handheld GPS and followed Richard toward the canyon. There were some cattle trails that wound back and forth along the slope and headed into the trees. One thing I’d learned about free range cattle is that they always know where the water is. Following their trail would lead us to the creek.

N7139L
Three-Niner-Lima in the landing zone, only 1/10 mile from the cabins.

We began to see signs of long-gone occupation as soon as we got into the shade of the tall trees that filled the canyon. First a thick pipe, broken here and there, which must have carried water from the spring-fed creek. Then an almost intact wagon wheel lying among the broken remains of a cart, some old tools, and saw blades. We continued down toward the creek, our feet crunching over years of fallen leaves. We walked around a thick bed of what looked like irises and then came face to face with the first cabin.

Photo
Photo
A wagon wheel and some tools were the first signs of civilization we encountered under the canopy of trees.

I don’t know who built the cabin or how long it had been standing beneath those trees, but I know it’s old — perhaps a hundred years or more. Its sides were made of crudely shaped wooden planks, which had colored with age to warm browns and dark grays. The roof was corrugated tin sheets, laid almost haphazardly to provide the best coverage. A stove pipe came though a hole in the roof and another pipe led from the ground into the wall. Two windows faced out over the stream, which gurgled softly nearby.

Photo
Richard approaches the main cabin.

A small porch and open doorway faced us and we wasted no time stepping up for a peek inside. There were two rooms, a kitchen and a bedroom. Inside the kitchen, we found the remains of a wood-burning stove and a sink with a countertop. A firewood bin had been built into the wall between them. In the bedroom, a bed frame stood neatly against the window. Although the floor looked to be in remarkably good condition, especially in the bedroom, Richard and I thought it best to stay outside, where we were less likely to damage the fragile remains.

Beyond the main cabin stood a second, smaller cabin, which had probably been used for storage. That cabin was surrounded with a dense growth of vines. Had I been properly dressed in heavy jeans and hiking shoes, I would have made my way through the growth for a closer look. But my lightweight slacks had already been torn on the 1/10 mile hike from the helicopter to the cabins and my Keds did little to protect my otherwise bare feet.

Photo
The other cabin.

Despite our find, Richard was still disappointed. He told me that the cabins he and his stepfather had found had apple trees growing in front of them. There was no sign of the trees that day — just the thick vines that covered the ground with a narrow cattle trail running through them. Although I pointed out that the trees could have died and rotted away during the past thirty years, he wasn’t convinced. He was sure we had the wrong cabins, although he thought we might be close. So we set off on a short hike down and then up the creek. Other than the cabins and some old fencing, there was no other sign of occupation.

After an hour exploring the area, it was warming up. Three-Niner-Lima sat at 5,000 feet — an elevation that would have an impact on its performance, especially on a hot day. Thermal updrafts and winds would be starting up soon, too. I was anxious to head out before performance and turbulence became an issue. As Richard and I climbed up out of the canyon and made our way back to Three-Niner-Lima, we talked about returning another day, with a better camera and the proper footwear for me. I marked the landing zone with a row of white rocks and walked around my ship to make sure stray cattle hadn’t damaged it while we were out of sight. Moments later, we were airborne, heading out over the canyon to start a spiraling climb over the mountain peaks between us and Wickenburg.

Richard, who is retired, spent the next few weeks trying to dig up some information about the cabins. He found an old man who knew about them and told him that there had indeed been apple trees. But some city slickers out camping in the wilderness had decided to cut them down for firewood. That had been years ago and no trace of the trees remained.

No trace of the people who lived there remain either. Or of visitors like us, who come to look but take pictures instead of souvenirs. Although the coordinates of the hidden cabins are safely stored in my GPS, they’ll remain hidden, too. Too many places have been destroyed by heartless vandals, who take pleasure in rubbing out the traces of our state’s history. I’d rather let nature reclaim the site at its own pace than share the secret location of the hidden cabins of the Weaver Mountains.

A Trip to Chandler, AZ for a New Attitude (Indicator)

Posted on by
Comment

I take a seasoned aerobatic pilot on a helicopter trip to Chandler and back.

My helicopter’s instrument panel includes an attitude indicator. That’s the gadget that tells you whether you’re flying straight and level or doing turns and climbs (or descents). My attitude indicator never worked right (how fitting!) in that it sometimes told me I was doing things I wasn’t doing. When it started telling me I was doing loops and rolls, I decided to get it fixed.

Ed Taylor pulled it out of my ship for me. He did some research and found a company that would fix it for a mere $1,195. Ouch. I made a few phone calls. A place in Mesa said they could fix it for me for about $900, but when I told them it was for a helicopter, they backed off. They said they didn’t have much luck with helicopter instruments and recommended that I buy a new one for about $1,400. I called the Chandler-based company they recommended and was told that the new one would be $1,700. Ouch ouch! But for $965, I could get an overhauled unit with the same one-year warranty as a new one. They had them in stock. I chatted with the woman for a while and she decided she liked me. She talked her boss down to $900. I gave her my credit card number before they could change their minds.

The day dragged on. A 2:30 meeting I had was finished in 10 minutes rather than an hour. At 3:00 PM, I was at the fuel pumps in Wickenburg with Three-Niner-Lima, doing a preflight for my trip to Chandler.

Nancy, one of our local pilots, stopped by. She’d just gone flying for the first time in several weeks and had put her plane away for the day. I didn’t know it, but she’d had a bicycle accident and that had kept her at home, nursing a nasty cut and bump on her head. Nancy flies a Decathalon, an aerobatic plane. In her words, the plane is “just as happy flying upside down as it is right side up.” So she flies it upside down a lot. And does loops and rolls. And hammerheads. The kinds of maneuvers that make some people sick. She does them a few times a week for about 20 to 30 minutes each outing, several miles north of the airport.

Nancy, who is also one of my favorite people, used to do aerobatics professionally. Now she just does it for fun. She’s 73 years old.

I asked Nancy what she was doing, and she told me she had nothing planned. I invited her to come with me on my trip to Chandler. She made a quick phone call, then hopped in. A while later, we were airborne, heading southeast. As we left, Gary, on duty at the airport, told me to remind Nancy that we couldn’t fly upside down.

I took my usual route to Chandler: southeast to Camelback mountain, east along the north side of Camelback, then south to Chandler. It avoids all other airspace, so the only airport you have to talk to is Chandler.

Nancy thoroughly enjoyed the flight. Years ago, her husband Bill owned a Hughes 269 helicopter. I’m not quite sure what that was, but Nancy tells me it sat three people. Probably a lot like a Schweitzer 300. They used to land it at their home in Scottsdale — we’re talking years ago — and later, at their home in Wickenburg. Oddly enough, their old home in Wickenburg now belongs to one of my neighbors, and I can clearly see the nice, flat area where Bill used to set down. She told me a story about how a friend of theirs once landed his helicopter at their home after they’d moved. “He realized pretty quick that we weren’t there anymore and took off,” she told me.

I got the impression that it had been a while since Nancy was in a helicopter. She said, “This is great,” about a dozen times. She remarked that in an airplane, you don’t see as much. That’s because in a plane, you’re not sitting in front of a window that’s bigger than you are.

We talked about the airport and the airport commission. Boring stuff that would put you to sleep if I detailed it here. Heck, it would put ME to sleep if I detailed it here.

I pointed out interesting landmarks along the way. Highways, malls, roads, mountains, airports. We could see right down the runway for Luke, just before we reached Arrowhead Mall. I remarked about the new construction. We listened to Scottsdale tower scold a pilot for flying the wrong direction. We searched for the Chandler High School, which was my landmark for approaching Chandler.

We came into Chandler and landed at the helipad near Quantum, then hover-taxied to the transient pad. I shut down. We walked to Varga, two buildings away from Quantum. Along the way, I saw Tristan’s helicopter, shoved up alongside the hangar, and ran into Paul Mansfield, my old mechanic. Paul greeted me warmly as ever. We talked about Tristan and how we wished we could slap him on the side of the head. Then we headed to Varga.

At Varga, we didn’t seem too welcome. But we eventually got the attention of the fat man behind the desk, who went into a back room to retrieve the attitude indicator. And here’s a funny thing. When I first talked to Ed about all this, I told him that I was thinking of replacing the attitude indicator with one that had a ball. The ball tells you if you’re in trim. My helicopter has trim strings that also do this, but they’re completely useless if its raining or dark. I thought it might be good to have a ball in the ship. Well guess what? The attitude indicator the fat man gave me had a ball.

We walked back to Quantum, stopping to chat with Paul again along the way. If it were up to Paul, we’d still be chatting with him. But we were anxious to get back before dark. It was already 5 PM and sunset was less than an hour away. The flight would take an hour. We pulled ourselves away and I took one last look at 45PG.

Meanwhile, Quantum’s R22s were flying in, like homing pigeons. One after another, they landed at the helipad and hover-taxied to parking spots. We started up as the last one glided past. I remembered all my radio calls, hover-taxied to the helipad when cleared, and took off to the west.

We went back along the south side of South Mountain, over the Gila River, over the northernmost part of the Estrella mountains, south of Goodyear, over Buckeye, and north along the Hassayampa. I wanted to show Nancy something different. She had a great time and I enjoyed her company. We set down at Wickenburg just before 6 PM.

Today, Ed installed my attitude indicator. I can’t wait to try out the ball.

On Radio Interviews

Posted on by
Comment

I start doing radio interviews again and remember why I stopped doing them in the first place.

I’m at home, sitting at a table (my old kitchen table, as a matter of fact) in our upstairs “den.” (If we had a family, we might call it a “family room.” But we don’t, so we don’t. We sometimes call it a “TV room,” because that’s where the TV lives, but I like to think that we use the room for more than just being pacified by the universal pacifier.) During the day, this room’s two 4 x 8 windows have an incredible view of the Weaver and Bradshaw mountains, but it’s dark now and I can’t see much more than the lights in a few neighbors’ homes. It’s 7:30 PM on a Friday night.

I’m waiting for the phone to ring.

I know who’s going to call. It’ll be David Lawrence, host of “Online Tonight with David Lawrence,” a radio talk show. Or it’ll be someone who works for him, just making the connection while David does other stuff in preparation for interviewing me. That’s why he’s calling, of course, I’m tonight’s guest on his show.

Oddly enough, this isn’t the first time I’ve been interviewed today. At about noon, I had to put my day on hold while I was interviewed by Alan Ashendorf and his partner (whose name I can’t remember; sorry!). I called at precisely 12 noon, chatted for about 20 minutes as a sort of dry run for the interview, and then got asked some of the same questions all over again, along with a few others. The whole thing took 45 minutes. I think I did pretty well. I only forgot what I was going to say once and, hopefully, they’ll edit that out. That’s one of the benefits of doing a taped interview. If I sound like a moron, they can fix things up to make me sound better. Of course, if I sound like a genius, they can also fix things up to make me sound worse. Whatever.

The interview by David will be live. With listener call-ins. I hate listener call-ins. Half the time, they expect you to solve some kind of obscure problem they’re having with their computer. The kind of problem that they shouldn’t be having in the first place, so you really don’t know why they’re having it, let alone how to solve it. But I like David and he supposedly “loves” me (for reasons I don’t quite understand). And I think he’ll protect me from the listener from hell. At least I hope so.

As you might have surmised, I don’t seem too enthusiastic about being interviewed. And you might be wondering why.

Peachpit Press used to line up interviews for me. Some of them were online chats which, I can safely say, are pretty much a complete waste of time. You’d check into a “chat room” at a prearranged time, then spend 50 minutes answering questions by typing them in. There would be about eight people in the audience — people who probably didn’t have much else to do with their time. Of those people, at least two worked for the organization that was holding the chat and at least one other was a fake person planted in the chat room to ask questions when no one else had anything to ask. Call me an idiot, but it wasn’t until I commented to someone about how one particular person turned up for all my chats that I was told that that person didn’t exist. And I thought I had a fan. Instead, I was wasting 50 minutes of my day typing words of wisdom for the benefit of five people.

Peachpit also lined up real interviews, though. There was one that I did in a radio station studio in the Los Angeles area years and years ago. I can’t remember why I was in LA — I certainly didn’t go just for the interview — but there I was, sitting at a table with a mike in front of me. We were live and listeners were calling in. And my headset didn’t work right so I couldn’t hear a word anyone was saying. Needless to say, I didn’t make much of an impression on that show.

There were others, too. Telephone interviews. I remember doing one while I was up at my property at Howard Mesa. Mind you, I’m on top of a mesa (a flat-topped mountain for you east coast folks), 5 miles down a dirt road from pavement that was 15 miles away from the nearest town. I did the interview on my cell phone, plugged into the car’s lighter jack with the windows rolled up. I don’t even remember what I was interviewed about or who interviewed me. For all I know, it might have been Alan Ashendorf and his partner — they seemed to remember me from another interview today.

The cell phone interview at Howard Mesa was the last straw. The problem was, Peachpit would line up these interviews weeks or months in advance. I had to arrange my schedule around these interviews. And I didn’t like that.

One of the best things about my lifestyle is its flexibility. With a day or two of planning, I can go places and do things that keep me far away from telephones and other ties to civilization. (In the old days, before dogs and horses and parrots and airports, we didn’t even need those planning days.) But things are a bit more difficult if I have to be reachable by a talk show host at a certain day or time.

So I told Peachpit I didn’t want to do any more interviews. Or chats. They tried once or twice to line something up for me, but I reminded them that I wasn’t interested. So they stopped. That was about two years ago.

Last month, I did a project for FileMaker, Inc. It was a very good project that required me to write a 15-page, illustrated document about using FileMaker Pro with Excel. The pay was excellent — heck, I wish I could get work like that all the time. But the pay included making myself available for — you guessed it — radio talk show interviews.

Earlier this week, the man in charge of lining up the interviews told me that he had two for me — both today. And because FileMaker, Inc. paid me to do them, here I am, waiting for the phone to ring.

What FileMaker, Inc. probably wouldn’t like is that this afternoon’s interview centered around my recently released Word 2003 book. That’s not what they wanted me to talk about. In fact, they sent a detailed e-mail message to both interviewers and me, outlining what they expected us to talk about. But the PR guy also made the fatal error of sending the interviewers my Word 2003 book. They didn’t care about FileMaker. Microsoft’s Office 2003 software release interested them a lot more. After all, there are millions of Word users throughout the world. What’s FileMaker Pro? I did my best. I mentioned FileMaker Pro twice in the interview. But neither interviewer picked up on it. I think Peachpit should pay the PR guy’s fee for this one.

But in reality, I know it was all a waste of time. My Word for Windows books never sold very well — they do just well enough to warrant revisions every two years when new versions come out — and I don’t expect one radio interview to change that. There’s too much competition in the Windows world and Peachpit is a very small player there.

Peachpit did send the books as requested. So the cat’s out of the bag: they know I’m doing interviews again. I wonder if they’ll try lining something up for me.

So here it is, now 8:00 PM. According to the PR guy, the show is at 8 PM mountain time. My time. And I’m wondering why the phone hasn’t rung yet.

But deep down inside, I know why. The PR guy got it wrong. The show is at 9 PM Pacific time. That means 10 PM mountain time. Which means I’ll be staying up late tonight.

I’m wrong! They called. I’m on.

— LATER —

The interview is over and it was a lot of fun. David does a great job interviewing people.

But guess what? We didn’t talk about FileMaker Pro.

Alex’s New Cage

Posted on by
2

I buy Alex a new cage and he won’t move in.

I had a feeling there would be a problem, but Janet made my worries seem ridiculous. So I bought the cage.

The idea was to buy Alex, my 18-month-old African Grey parrot, a new cage. This would be one I could leave outside so he could spend nice days outdoors without me having to wheel his cage in and out. Moving the cage is a royal pain in the butt, and I only do it when it’s time to hose it out. A second cage would make life easier and get Alex some fresh air while I was at work.

Janet and I took Mike’s pickup down to Phoenix to Bird Expo West (or some similar name), a one-day bird show where we were sure to find great bird deals. Janet’s significant other, Steve, has a scarlet macaw named Calypso. He’s a monstrously huge bird with a beak large enough to break bones and a scream loud enough to wake the dead. While Alex may chew on toilet paper rolls and small pieces of wood, Calypso can tear through two-by-fours. Janet was looking for something to keep him occupied so he’d stop chewing the blinds.

The show was very big and very good. There was a little of everything: toys, food, cages, and birds for sale. The place was filled with bird noise, as if we were walking through an aviary. At one point, Janet missed a cell phone call because she never heard the phone ring over the din.

We bought toys. I didn’t buy many — I think I spent about $15 total. They were all brightly colored wood and wicker toys. Small toys that Alex could chew up within a few days each. They were cheap and would last Alex about two months. Janet bought bigger toys that she carried around in heavy bags. She also bought a few smaller toys for her Budgie, who’d lost his partner over the summer.

There were all kinds of cages, from the smallest carry box for a finch to huge, walk-in aviaries. And the prices on cages were incredible. Cages that would cost $500 in PetSmart were $200 or less. At my top budget price of $200, there was plenty to choose from. Including the corner cage with the rounded front.

Take a moment to imagine this. Alex lives in a rectangular cage in the corner of my dining room/kitchen. The cage is about 26″ deep and about 34″ wide. Add to that about 4″ on each side for the “seed catchers” that do a so-so job of keeping dropped food and toys from falling on the floor. As a result, a big corner of my kitchen is taken up by Alex’s living space.

I’d seen corner cages before, but had never seen one quite as spacious as the one at the show. (Mind you, there were other less spacious ones there, too.) This one would give Alex all the room he needed to live quite comfortably. Best of all, its two flat sides, which would be tucked into the corner, measured only 26″ wide. With the rounded front, the cage would take up much less space than Alex’s current cage. It was even green, almost the same color as the cage he already had, which matched my kitchen.

It all makes sense, right? Buy the corner cage, move Alex into it, and use his current cage for outdoors.

But there was a little voice inside my head that told me it wasn’t such a good idea. You see, Alex likes his cage. He likes to hang out in it. He likes to climb all over it — even upside down from its roof. Sometimes, in the morning, I can’t get him to come out. He spends the day in there, and he sleeps in there. It’s his room, his personal space.

I told this to Janet and she looked at me like I was nuts. He’ll get used to it, she told me. He got used to the one he’s in, didn’t he?

She was right — or at least she sounded right to me. So I bought the cage.

You know what comes next. I brought the cage home and wheeled it into the kitchen to show Alex. He was on top of his cage, just hanging around, and when he saw the new cage, he took a dive to the floor. He was shaking like a leaf when I showed him the new cage. He jumped off my hand several times. Over the next two days, every time I brought him close to the cage, he’d climb on my shoulder so he could be as far away from it as possible. Any time I’d try to get him to step onto the cage, he’d dive onto the floor. Obviously, not only did he dislike the cage, he was terrified of it.

Well the cage is installed in the opposite corner of the dining area, where Alex can look at it all day. I’ve installed some perches and toys in it. I lined the top with paper — not an easy task, given the quarter circle shape. And I keep trying to get Alex to take an interest in it.

The sad part is, I bought the cage to save room in my kitchen, and so far, I’ve just lost more space.