Many people, few planes at Fly-in

It was good meeting new and old friends (like André and the aspiring pilot Margrete) at the MAF Norway annual Fly-In this weekend.

Low stratus and rain showers kept all visitors but me on the ground as the Fly-In at Starmoen started Saturday. We spent four hours waiting at Kjeller for conditions to be better. As we left a restaurant in Lillestrøm after a late lunch, a bit of sun came through the low sky base. The AeroWeather app on my iPhone said VMC at ENGM, and we called our friends at Starmoen for an update to receive good news. At 3 p.m. LN-NAG was the 2nd plane of the day to leave the busiest GA airport in Norway, and we followed the Glomma river in 500 ft. AGL. A few showers en route made it good to have a FlightSim enthusiast as my manual autopilot, and a pastor in the back seat was also nice. 1:55 of airtime. Only 0:30 going back on a direct track transiting ENGM CTR the next day.

A great weekend with good people doing very important work, 3:40 flying time, and a new airport in my logbook: ENAE at the national parachuting centre became my #93.

Good clean fun

Erik washing our white swan after landings on the dirt strip at Hokksund. He wanted to take his son Rune along for a birthday flight, but the airfield was in too bad condition for all three of us to get up from the 600 meters.

Solution: First Rune and I flew over Drammen, then Erik and I flew back to Kjeller while Rune drove Erik's car the 85 km.

Plan B for splash-in lunch

My college Vilde and I had plans for a working lunch in the nice sorroundings of Villa Fridheim, but LN-AEG had only 16 gallons of fuel, and the Kilen Seaplanebase were out of Avgas. Plan B became a short flight of the Oslofjord, and lunch at Sjøflyhavna Kro. Worked quite well.

Something old, something new

Øyvind (left) gave me a demo flight in the posh SR20 during the Cirrus gathering at Kjeller this weekend, and then Petter (over) joined me for my first flight in the good old C150. Quite different experiences. Both to be repeated.

My first G1000 solo

Einar studying the G1000 Cockpit Reference Guide after having joined me on my first glass cockpit solo. I remembered the basics, but the manual will be a dear friend for some time to come.

Glass Cockpit Checkout

Completing the G1000 checkout with CFI Odd at NRFK, I now know the basics about PFD, MFD, GDU, GMA, GIA, GDC, GRS, GMU, GTX, GEA, and GSD. While enjoying the integrated autopilot and a wealth of flight-critical data at my fingertips, I barely remembered to look out the window...

Splash-in at Holmsbu for Coffee

My sister-in-law Solfrid at Holmsbu Spa. After a full day at the Tusenfryd theme park with our families, we drove my Harley to the Kilen Seaplane Base and flew to Holmsbu for coffee. Then we continued flying into the sunset until we reached the Villa Fridheim fairytale castle by Krøderen, and returned to Kilen before dark. A nice summer day.

Petter's Flying Fun Day

Sigrid, Lise, Tone, and Liss had fun flying with Petter (6), celebrating him leaving kindergarten to start school this fall. His older brother Jostein also invited the nice people at Starveien Barnehage on a flight three years ago as he left for school.

Liss joined us for flying fun both times, and asked us to consider having more children...