I took delivery of Sting Sport N912N and after familiarization in the aircraft from Bill Canino, I prepared to begin ferrying the airplane from North Little Rock to Nut Tree (VCB) Airport in Vacaville, CA. Very early on the morning of my planned departure I was awakened by loud thunder, lightning, and heavy rainfall giving me the idea that my day was not off to a good start. By 6:00 a.m. it was still raining heavily in so I went out to the airport to wait for the weather to clear. It was after noon before the front passed, the clouds broke and the sun came through so my plans for a full day of flying were already changed.

Weather checking revealed that the Little Rock area was clear, Fort Smith, AR, and Oklahoma were clear so I filed a flight plan to Clinton, OK (CLK) and prepared to leave. I shortly discovered that, while these areas were clear, there was still remaining clouds over the Ozarks with some small rain showers. Leaving the Little Rock area and using Interstate 40 as a good guide for low altitude flight I was able to work my way clear of the clouds and was finally greeted with sunny skies in the Fort Smith area.

Now enjoying beautiful weather in eastern Oklahoma I climbed to 4,500 and set a GPS course direct to Clinton that would pass south of Oklahoma City and Tinker Air Force Base. As I approached the Oklahoma City area, I had radar contact with approach control who advised me that an Air Force E-3 AWACS aircraft was approaching me from the north at 4,000 feet. This airplane was quite easy to see with the large radar antenna on top, but the pilot of the E-3 couldn’t see me; an eerie feeling since he would pass just behind me and 500 feet lower. All went well and I was soon clear of the large airplane.

After leaving the Oklahoma City area there was just the slowly rising plains and an uneventful flight of 3.5 hours to Clinton, OK, where I was cordially received, refueled, and offered a ride to a local motel. The following day promised beautiful flying weather throughout the southwest United States and I intended to take full advantage of it.

HIGH DESERT AND MOUNTAINS
Getting an early morning take off, the Sting climbed quickly out of Clinton to 4,500 feet and then I step-climbed to 8,500 feet as the terrain of Oklahoma, the Texas panhandle and New Mexico continued to rise. Four hours later Moriarity, NM (0E0) came into view and the Sting landed nicely in the 6,300 foot elevation of this airfield. The airfield had some glider activity but there was no one to be found around the fuel pumps or the FBO.

It was now about noon with a temperature in the 88º F and a density altitude of 8,500 feet and I was curious as to the take off performance of the Sting under these conditions. I noted that the gliders and their tow craft were making mid field take offs with no problem but I always use the full runway available. Any way the Sting seemed like to conditions and I was quickly 500 feet in the air by mid field.

In front of me were the Sandia Mountains around Albuquerque and the Tijeras Canyon area that was known to me to sometimes have severe turbulence. I elected to pass to the south of Albuquerque where the terrain was not quite as high and I could hopefully avoid any severe turbulence. This worked well and I was soon over the highest terrain and once more following Interstate 40 west.

Climbing to 10,500 feet gave me a fairly smooth ride in an area where some peaks were over 11,000 feet high. This is beautiful country. For those who are unfamiliar with the southwest US deserts this is a treat that you have known at least from all of those famous western movies. This scenery continued the rest of the afternoon flight and 2.8 hours later I landed at Winslow, AZ to complete the flying day.

Meteor Crater off the wing of N912N, near Winslow, Arizona

WEATHER INTERVENES
The third day I had hoped to fly all the way home, but the central valley of California was covered with overcast skies, so I zselected a refueling stop at Apple Valley (APV) in the California high desert. But first after leaving Winslow I wanted to make a photo run by Meteor Crater located not far west of Winslow. It soon came into view and the early morning light was just perfect for photographing this fantastic crater. Then it was climbing back to 10,500 feet across Flagstaff and Kingman and down to Apple Valley. There were high surface winds in all of this high desert area and at Apple Valley they were thirty degrees off of the runway heading at 20 gusting to 29 knots. The manual says the Sting had been tested to 17 knots of cross wind and these cross winds could be as high as 15 knots. Using power right through to touchdown the Sting behaved like the lady she is and rolled smoothly onto the runway, quickly slowing to taxi speed in about 50 feet and requiring power to get off the runway. The Sting has good cross wind characteristics.

Weather checks at Apple Valley still did not permit VFR flight into the central valley of California so an overnight stay was required in nearby Victorville. There is a convenient van service to the hotel in Victorville. The following day indicated that the central valley was still socked in, so not liking to sit around the hotel watching the Weather Channel, I flew a short hop over to Gen. Fox Field (WJF) at Lancaster, CA to wait for clearing weather. Fox tower cleared me for a straight in approach with winds straight down the runway at 20 knots. Flying a 60 knot final was slow going and I heard the tower advise another aircraft on downwind to extend because “this guy is really slow.” I used as much power as feasible to be a good neighbor. Again there were good connections to local hotels from the airport.

THE LAST LEG HOME
My fifth day enroute started out with the same central valley weather problems but in the early afternoon the overcast skies began to break and I was able to take off. Clouds being blown out of the central valley over the Tehachapi Mountains required me to climb to around 11,000 feet before I was able to descend in the Bakersfield, CA area through the now scattered to broken cloud deck. At 2,500 feet over the central valley my ground speed now jumped to about 105 knots, a decided improvement over the 85 knot ground speed I had had on most of the westerly flights from Arkansas.

The San Joaquin Valley of California is part of the nations’ bread basket and I flew over this flat farm land under sunny skies for over an hour. As I approached Suisun Bay the clouds became overcast again at about 3,000 feet, but I was now safely VFR below them. Contact with Travis Air Force Base approach control revealed that I would be sharing airspace with a commercial Boeing 747 and an Air Force C-5, so good prudence and a healthy respect for wake turbulence caused me to move well to the east of them as I approached Vacaville’s Nut Tree Airport. On landing I was greeted by my wife and friends who all came out to welcome the Sting’s arrival. The Sting Sport was then well photographed by my friends and soon comfortable in her new hanger.

A summary of this delivery flight shows 1,633 nautical miles flown in 18.3 flying hours for an average ground speed of 89 knots. The additional wing fuel tanks permitted flights of around four hours with ample reserves if weather conditions changed. Fuel consumption for the entire run averaged 4.49 gallons per hour. All of this came with flights over two major mountain ranges and some of the best desert scenery in the world. And it was a lot of fun!