First Solo Landaway PPL
28 Aug 2005This was the first time I had flown to another airport and landed by myself, the weather was perfect even though cloud was forecast for my flight, the visibility was perfect and not very much wind. I went out to the plane, gave it a quick check over then taxied it to the fuel pumps, filled it right up and then took off from runway 13 at Plymouth. I climbed up to 3000’ while heading out towards Ivybridge and once I reached there I turned towards Exeter and essentially followed the road up.
Exeter picked me up on radar, when I got near the racecourse, and when I reached Topsham I was told to join left downwind for 26, as I was flying downwind another aircraft which had just landed had the same (shortened) call sign as me - “golf tango oscar”, so I was answering to his instructions for a little while until I realized and told the tower with my full call sign (“golf bravo sierra tango oscar”) that I was downwind and then the tower realized too, and told me to report final, and then called the other aircraft with their full call sign - a little bit confusing!
I turned final behind a FlyBe dash 8, and then landed smoothly in a very slight crosswind. I taxied onto the grass parking, shut down the engine, went into the back rooms of the airport and up into the tower, paid the landing fee (£17.40) and got my pilots pass to be able to go airside again. Then I walked past all the tanned people which were pouring out of the arrivals area with their bags, went back out to my plane, gave it another quick check.
I started the engine, taxied right up to the end of the runway, took off and got some nice shots of Exeter, then I followed the road back to Ivybridge, (I could see the airport from miles away) then I joined downwind left for runway 13 at Plymouth landed not too badly, taxied back in and shut down the engine, it was quite fun but I’m glad Exeter was quite fairly quiet because recently it’s been really busy for some reason