Route of Flight

Route of Flight

Monday, September 10, 2007

Day Two: El Paso to Junction, TX

Since we went to bed relatively early last night, the 6am wake-up call wasn't too jarring. However, after a quick look at the weather, we decided to take our time. Before breakfast, we pretty much decided to stay in El Paso for another day and do some sightseeing, including going to see the Rio Grande River and go see the Bodies Human exhibit. After breakfast and analyzing the weather again, we decided to continue eastbound, yet take a more southerly route to avoid the rain showers and thunderstorms between El Paso and Ft. Worth. The idea was to get closer to Ft. Worth, so after looking at the latest radar picture again, a heading of about 097 would keep us clear of precip taking us to Fort Stockton, TX and if a call to Flight Watch en route resulted in good news, would get us to Junction, TX. We checked out of the hotel right at check-out time, returned the car, loaded up the plane, got our VFR clearance and departed El Paso on runway 8R. The cloud bases were at around 7000 ft, so with a ground elevation of 4000 ft or so, we flew at 6500 ft to stay VFR yet keep as much distance between us and the ground as possible. Albuquerque center and Houston center gave us flight following the entire way, but issued us no traffic alerts as we experienced light turbulence and empty skies all the way to Junction. After landing, Bill the airport manager greeted us at the plane and offered his phone to call flight service and a look at his "weather station" to see if we could press on. After entering the little prisoner-built stone log building, Bill sat in his Laz-E-Boy, showed us the weather station (a television with the Weather Channel selected), and described the town's lodging options should we decide to stay. The verdict was to stay, so Bill drove us to the Best Western and said to call in the morning when we were ready to be picked up. Turns out that due to all the rain Texas has received in the past several months, Kimble County has been inundated with crickets and other critters. During our walk to Cooper's BBQ for dinner, we endured several cricket attacks, but made it back to the hotel uninjured. Looks like we should finally make it to Ft. Worth tomorrow. Today's flight totals: 3.2 hours, 355 miles. Trip totals: 8.6 hours, 939 miles, four states.

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