My first solo flight after gaining my RPL was just a short trip from Moorabbin down toward the Mornington Peninsula.
I felt good about gaining my RPL, but there were a couple things I could have done better during my flight review and, being my own worst critic, they were eating at my confidence a little.
The views along the beaches down to Frankston were really nice; but I was too preoccupied with getting my inbound procedures and radio calls right and so turned back sooner than planned to put all that into practice.
I told Moorabbin tower I was having radio issues, hoping they could hear, and turned back out over the bay to sort things out.
That was before Christmas, so it was almost three weeks before I was able to fly again.
I had planned to go for a fly on the last day before returning to work, but bushfire smoke haze put an end to that idea.
So I booked a Warrior for the following Saturday, wary that I was out of practice with my tower procedures.
The forecast wasn't great, low cloud and a strong westerly breeze that meant a crosswind landing regardless of which runways were active. That normally wouldn't bother me but I figured I had enough to think about without dealing with that so I rescheduled for the next day.
Was I getting cold feet?
With rain to the east of Melbourne I decided to fly to my old stomping ground Lethbridge via westbound Melbourne Coastal Route - which I had originally planned to do once I gained more confidence flying from Moorabbin.
But I had flown along the Coastal Route during my cross-country training and knew all the VFR visual cues between Albert Park and Laverton BOM tower. All I had to do was stay at the prescribed height.
It was also a good opportunity to return to catch up with a couple of my favourite instructors, so I happily accepted my own challenge.
The aircraft I booked, Piper Warrior Bravo Zulu Echo had no other takers that day so I made a point of arriving early to take my time with the pre-flight.
I handled the radio calls as though I had done them yesterday, even when the controller asked me to extend my upwind until I passed two approaching helicopters on downwind.
I spotted both choppers and made a belated downwind departure toward Albert Park Lake before joining the Coastal Route at Station Pier.
The cloud base was about 2500ft, more than enough headroom for the 2000ft limit when flying west, to stay under Melbourne Class C - aircraft heading east are limited to 1500ft.
The rest of the flight to Lethbridge, included flying through Avalon Class E was pretty straight forward and it felt good to land there again, though it actually felt a little odd to again have to make a CTAF call to no one in particular.
I had a great chinwag with my former instructors and, after about an hour, prepped Bravo Zulu Echo for the return flight. This had been the first time I'd ever flown somewhere else with a purpose that wasn't part of a navigation exercise and it felt really satisfying.
On start-up I had an issue with the radio where it wouldn't go to the main screen on pressing the OK button on the Garmin 430. After pressing a couple of other buttons it finally went to the screen I needed and took off from Lethbridge at 1pm.
The cloud hadn't lifted so I stayed at 1500ft and rode out the bumps over the parched ground as I headed east in anticipation of the coastal route height limit.
The views approaching the CDB were even better, but I turned before Station Pier and flew over water to avoid the parachutists at Point Ormond on the way to the Brighton reporting point to make my inbound call.
Radio troubles
I had Melbourne Central and YMMB ATIS on Comm 2 and both worked fine. I switched to Comm 1 and made my inbound call but heard no reply or anyone else on frequency.
Damn - did I press a button when trying to get the radio working or turn the squelch button too far?
I couldn't head into Moorabbin airspace without radio contact, I told the tower I was having
radio issues, hoping they could hear, and turned back out over the bay to sort things out.
I didn't think, OK I forgot about, changing the transponder code to 7600 to let ATC know I was having radio problems, so rather than try to fix the radio I just selected the tower frequency on Comm 2 and made another inbound call.
The controller responded telling me to set up for base on one-seven right and then asked if I could hear him, which conformed they had heard me.
I was a little flustered and realised I was setting up base for Runway 13 Right instead of 17 Right - it's amazing how a few degrees makes such a difference.
As I began to correct my approach, while looking out for traffic, the controller asked me to go back out to Ricketts Point and await further instruction.
Needless to say this turned out to be a godsend as it showed this the perfect spot to line up for base for one-seven right for next time. It later crossed my mind that perhaps he saw I was coming in at an odd angle and discreetly set me straight.
I landed without a hitch, but after leaving the runway forgot to select the ground frequency on Comm 2 which meant a delay before making my taxi to apron call, but that didn't seem to bother the controller.
I shut down the aircraft feeling pretty satisfied how things went. My radio calls were good and I handled the unexpected directions from the controllers well.
And while I likely did something to the radio back at Lethbridge, I was pleased how I calmly handled the comms issue.
And I was glad I went ahead and did this flight instead of something a little easier in the search for confidence it turns out I already had.
Oops!
As it turns out when starting the Garmin 430 I was pressing the Procedures (PROC) button directly under the OK prompt on the screen (as displayed below with a different message), and not the Enter (ENT) button on the side.
For some reason that seemed to work for me previously - I actually thought it means Proceed. I am now studying YouTube videos and online manuals to get to know the system more.
