Aileron

It occurred to me that I should probably find out how Joanna reacts to small planes since, if for some reason she was terrifically frightened or sickened by them, that would change how much energy I should invest in flying. Aviation opens a lot of exciting opportunities, from camping at secluded backcountry airstrips, to acrobatics, to the Civil Air Patrol, but one of the primary "missions" I had in mind was simply taking the family from point A to point B.

So I asked Joanna about doing a discovery flight, a first lesson that flight schools sell for cheap to try to get someone hooked on flying. She sounded excited. My flight instructor suggested the three of us go together and make an afternoon of it: we would fly from Palo Alto to Half Moon Bay (KHAF), with me having a lesson on the way there, Joanna having her discovery flight on the way back, and a nice lunch in the middle at Half Moon Bay.

When the day came, clouds were threatening to sock in KHAF so we decided to go to San Carlos (KSQL) instead. A minor bummer since that route wouldn't include flying over the hills and along the ocean, but adapting plans in response to weather is a big part of flying, so might as well drive that point home from start. I took off on a left Dumbarton departure out of KPAO to do some maneuvers before heading over to KSQL. Once we got up to 2000 ft though, we could see that KHAF was actually clear. It's easy to forget how close the ocean is to us in the south bay. The only roads leading there are small twisty ones that go over the hills to the west so driving always takes at least 90 minutes. And the hills block the view, so the illusion is that the ocean is this far away place. But in a plane as soon as you have enough altitude to see over the hills, the ocean is right there, a deep flat blue with white surf where it meets the land.

Seeing it and not going was too much to bear. Also my instructor was taking his job as aviation salesperson very seriously and scenery scores mucho sales points, so I pointed the little plane towards the ocean and we began to climb over the hills. Half Moon Bay is pretty easy to spot with its distinctive hook of land. The airport is untowered and almost right on the ocean. We landed and walked to Mezza Luna, an Italian restaurant right next to the airport.

As planned, Joanna flew her discovery flight on the way back. She loved it and my instructor and I breathed a sign of relief – no one's hobbies were being grounded any time soon. People are always surprised how much control a person with no experience can be given on a discovery flight. But in the air, there are not that many things to hit and a lot of room to correct yourself if you get into something funny. Joanna's flying was fairly smooth and lacked the over-controlling over-adjustments of my first flights, but the video later showed she had a pretty mean death grip on the yoke, the natural response to realizing that for the first time you're in control of an airplane.

The weather had used the lunch hour to increase the updrafts at the hills and there was now a cloud bank solidifying rapidly. If we couldn't find a clearing in the clouds to get over the hills, we would have to continue south along the coast, out from under the 4000 ft bravo shelf, before we could climb to get over the clouds. But we found an opening and were soon back in our familiar valley, crossing the particle accelerator (SLAC), overflying the Stanford campus, and into the KPAO airspace. Joanna continued flying all the way to the runway threshold, then my instructor took over and landed.

For the record, Joanna logged 0.5 hrs PIC time.

• Flight Hours: Δ0.6   Σ16.8