182 to Santa Maria

The Cessna 182T (N51732) is back in the air!  Tim Machugh (another CFI) and I flew my two planes down to Santa Maria California to get the front of the fuselage painted.  The sheet metal and riveting work on the aircraft requires quite a bit of painting, but not too bad.

The trip from Livermore to Santa Maria was without event, but it was quite the interesting flight

  1. We decided to depart VFR since there were more than enough 'wide' windows into the blue sky. 

  2. We stayed away from all clouds, but when we started listening to ATC on our COMM radios, we heard about hale and sever thunderstorms just 25 miles away, so we turned away from those possible convective events towards the south

  3. Once on top, it was relatively smooth flying with occasional turbulence when we got a little too close

  4. It was fascinating watching the weather develop around us, but safe

  5. I had to fly a little slower than my partner who was in my 172SP.  It took us about an hour to get there.

  6. We landed in Santa Maria with no incidents


Climbing between the clouds to altitude out of Livermore


Climbing through vertically developed clouds


Above the clouds, watching the thunderstorms form


Every once in awhile, an open window


Let's get away from this one - a little bumpy


Nearing Santa Maria, things started clearing up


The Coast/Pacific Ocean.  It was clearer right on the coast than inland


Ahhhhh


Looking West towards San Luis Obispo


The San Luis Obispo airport

This page was last modified on 12/03/2006