Everything was on schedule except for my inability to sleep all the way to my alarm. I was awake around 4:30am which ended up being good...I got a thorough internet weather check done, caught up with email, and was able to take my time getting to the airport. I arrived at the hangar around 5:30am. Right on schedule.
Speaking of schedule, I had fretted a little since I would be meeting my father at Guadalajara, and I wanted somehow to be able to notify him of my updated ETA. I had no idea how long I'd get caught up in Obregon or what kind of stumbling blocks I might hit. I didn't want him to have to hang out at Guad for hours on end waiting and worrying. At first, I just blindly assumed that the phone system in Mexico would be troublesome at best. But in the end I found out that my AT&T cell phone would most likely work in all major cities down there. A few days ago I added a Mexican calling plan to my AT&T cell phone service, which would not only make calling Mexico from the U.S. relatively cheap, but it would also apparently enable me to call within Mexico and back to the U.S. from Mexico easily. And, somewhat importantly, it would allow me to make "data" calls within Mexico (i.e. for sending text messages or email from the handset in the air). I had tested out calling Mexico the day before, and I was amazed at the quality. Anyway, when I arrived at the hangar I called and woke my father up to let him know that I was on schedule, and that I'd try to call from Obregon.
Shivering in the early morning California cold (it was in the mid 40s) I loaded the plane and did a pre-flight. Ready to go, I got in, started her up, and as the engine warmed up I entered the flight plan into the GPS. I taxied out to 26R. The tower was still in suspended operation. At 5:54am, the oil was warm enough, and I blasted off into the darkness, 6 minutes ahead of schedule.
What was unusual about logging this flight was that I logged some night flight but had no night landings. For the first 15 minutes or so I was flying in total darkness -- other than the lights on the ground, of course. I headed over Paradise VOR in my climb to 9500'. I headed direct to Imperial VOR. About 20 minutes after taking off the sun started to rise.
Warmed mostly by the heat by my feet, the panel was "warm" visually.
About 15 minutes into the flight I hit some continuous light turbulence over the hills.
Everything was looking A-OK. Engine was happy, fuel burn was nice and efficient at 9.4 gallons per hour, full throttle at 2450 RPM. Ignore the clock, I still haven't set it back for daylight savings. And if you're wondering about the left tank, my capacitive adapter is sent in for a software update. The fuel totalizer is way more reliable anyway. 4:01 fuel remaining. That's great, because I'll be there in three hours.
Here's the Salton Sea at sunrise.
Another shot as it got brighter.
I had contacted SoCal approach right after departing, and at this point I was talking to LA Center. At one point, I switched over to San Diego Radio (on 122.5, I believe) to update them on my exact ETA for border crossing, and then switched back to LA Center.
Here comes the sun...
I was getting bumped around a little and was fumbling with my camera in the low light, but I managed to get one crappy shot about 17 miles out from Mexicali.
Well, here goes nothing...that diagonal line is the border.
I was talking to Mexicali Tower at this point. The border passed and nothing happened. No F-16s, no admonition from Mexicali. If I recall, I had been asked to report over the station at Mexicali. I requested that Mexicali notify customs of my proposed arrival at Obregon, and they said they would do that.
After reporting in initially, I was asked to report 20 DME from Mexicali. Position reporting in Mexico is a little different than it is here in the U.S. You basically contact the facility, give them your position, and they request a specific reporting point by "DME" -- don't worry if you don't physically have DME onboard, the controllers just use the term "DME" to mean distance from the station. You can use GPS or landmarks or whatever if you don't actually have DME (I don't). So anyway, after initially contacting a facility, you're usually asked to report over or abeam the station (depending on your route). After that report, they usually ask you to report at 50 DME or whatever coincides with the perimeter of their control zone, at which point you usually get a handoff.
First signs of the northwest end of the Sea of Cortez. When I reported 20 DME from Mexicali, Mexicali gave me the frequency and instructed me to contact Hermosillo approach. Hermosillo approach? I was still 175 miles away or something. Well, I tried to contact them, but wasn't suprised when I heard absolutely nothing. I had read somewhere that this is common, that there are areas between distantly spaced facilities where you won't be talking to anybody for potentially long periods of time. Apparently you're supposed to issue position reports in the blind on frequency. I'm not sure if that's because there are remote communications outlets that can receive only, or whether it's just good practice for other aircraft in the same situation, or both. Anyway, I reported my position every 25 miles or so. I also monitored 122.8, which I believe is the most common air-to-air and CTAF frequency for uncontrolled airports in Mexico. As the morning went on, I heard more and more position reporting and traffic reporting on 122.8.
I was on my way from Mexicali to Punta Penasco VOR (technically "Peñasco" but I'm gonna leave off the tilde going forward) when I saw these dunes to the southeast.
At this point I could see much more of the Sea of Cortez (darker blue in the background).
With my luck, the winds were out of the east instead of the usual westerlies, but I found a spot where the winds were relatively light. I was making good time. Notice that on the SL30 I had the "Show DST Data" enabled (distance, speed, time). This is extremely handy for those "DME" reports. For whatever VOR you've got tuned in the active NAV, the GX60 feeds the SL30 DST data. So while I had the distance to the next station displayed on the GX60, I had distance from the last station displayed on the SL30. Very helpful for this somewhat different position reporting system!
More dunes.
I dug the way the low sun cast shadows on 'em.
I was probably about 50 miles out from Punta Penasco at this point, and I could still sort of see across to Baja.
This is the Desierto del Altar (Altar Desert).
Here's a crappy shot of the WAC chart. That top dotted blue line that crosses the desert is the course I was following.
This is the bay just northwest of Punta Penasco.
Off to the east/northeast the dunes and desert continued.
Baja all but disappeared. I had the notion that on this flight I'd be able to see Baja most of the way, but that was wishful thinking. The Sea of Cortez is huge.
Here's Punta Penasco, a.k.a. Rocky Point -- also known as Puerto Penasco. This is like an hour and a half from home. I intend to fly down here sometime for a few days with Jen. It's an airport of entry and they have fuel, and there are condos and hotels right on the beach. It looks gorgeous.
This was pretty much the only time I was over water on this whole trip down. Over the bay just south of PPE, I was just a few miles offshore.
This is the peninsula south of PPE. Might be cool to have a bush plane with tundra tires and land right on the beach, camp out, etc.
It was a pretty hazy day down here. This was somewhere northwest of Hermosillo. Looking toward the mountains in the east the view wasn't that spectacular.
Around 75 miles out of Hermosillo I was able to reach approach, and the position reporting resumed. When making initial contact, you basically just tell them who you are, where you are, you departed X, and you're on a flight plan heading to Y. Pretty straightforward.
This is Hermosillo, a pretty big city.
The hills to the east of Hermosillo.
Cutting ahead, I was on the visual approach into Obregon.
The airport at Ciudad Obregon is easy to spot.
I was instructed to enter left downwind for runway 31.
After landing, I asked the tower for instructions on taxiing to customs. The airport is really straightforward. There's a general aviation ramp on the east side beyond the commercial ramp. There was a guy waving me in. Couldn't have been easier. After shutting down, the guy came up and asked a few questions, like my name, the type of aircraft, my point of departure, my destination, etc. I used as much Spanish as I could, but he was able to speak some English. Seems like most people there are familiar with the basic common aviation terms even if they don't really speak English. The fuel truck pulled up, and the "guys with guns" (Mexican military) walked over. I had no idea what to expect, but what I got were some very curious and very impressed dudes toting machine guns, asking, "Es tuyo? Hecho en casa?" (Is it yours? Homebuilt?) Si! I replied, "Hecho en la garaje de mi casa," but I don't think "garaje" translates exactly from "garage" in English. Oh well, I tried. Speaking in even limited Spanish goes a long way...if you make an effort to communicate it seems like they appreciate it.
While I was escorted to the general aviation building the dudes with guns continued to pore over the plane -- not in a military/law enforcement way, but more just checking out the friggin' cool plane. I got the sense that they don't see too many RVs down there!
The way it works at Obregon, and it seems in most of Mexico, is that everything is departmentalized. It's not like it is in the U.S. where you go into the FBO and pay all your fuel and landing and parking fees in one place. In Mexico, at least where I was, you've got two or three different offices, usually right nextdoor to each other, where you do your flight plan stuff, customs stuff, and fuel and fee stuff. You end up going from office to office to office -- just have to roll with it. In this case at Obregon, they were very helpful in instructing me where to go and when. First I went into the office where I presented my documents, closed my flight plan, and opened the new flight plan to Guadalajara. Note that I was asked for my insurance at that point, and I provided him with the Mapfre Tepeyac policy that I had obtained through MacAfee and Edwards. I didn't bother showing him my Phoenix policy or asking whether that would have sufficed...the last thing I wanted to do at this point was rock the boat.
Next I was escorted over to customs, which is in the commercial terminal nextdoor. I showed my passport and filled out a form. The way customs works in Mexico is they have a "traffic light" looking thing, where you press a button and a light turns either green ("Pase") or red (I forget what it says). If it's green, go ahead, done deal. If it's red, they'll inspect your bags. It's just a random thing to the best of my knowledge. I pushed the button and it turned green. Pase. Cool. By the way, as I was filling out my customs paperwork, one guy asked me how many hours it took to fly to Obregon from LA, and then how many more hours to Guadalajara. I told him approximately tres horas a Obregon, y tres horas mas a Guadalajara -- about six and a half hours total. He exclaimed to the other guy, "Que economico!!!" And then I'm pretty sure I heard something in Spanish to the tune of, "Geez, dude, we need to get going on our empennage..." Just kidding, but the "Que economico" comment was real.
I was escorted over to the office two doors down where I paid for fuel, landing fee, etc. Digressing for a second, I've published an expense log from this trip. Here is a spreadsheet showing every cent I spent on this trip. Anyway, at the fuel office I paid about 1100 pesos (about 100 bucks) for the 126 liters (33.3 gallons) of fuel, an airspace fee, a landing/ramp fee, and an administrative fee. It sounds like a lot of fees, but it really wasn't bad at all. The fuel worked out to $2.51 per gallon including all taxes, which is cheaper than I would have paid here in the U.S. All said and done, it cost me $101 to get in and out of Obregon with topped off tanks. For what it's worth, I paid for fuel and these fees with a credit card. I had been carrying a buttload of cash, about $1000, just in case. I had read that you want to carry plenty of cash and have small bills, since it's impossible to make change. In the end I ended up using very little cash on this trip.
From there I was escorted nextdoor, back to the original GA office. I paid the one-time fee for "entrance authorization" into Mexico. This is a per-person, per-trip thing that cost me 502 pesos, or $52 -- which isn't the most favorable conversion, but it's only a couple of bucks lost in the conversion. You pay this fee at your A.O.E. (airport of entry), and now you have the option of making it a "multi-entrance authorization." This will let you pay once per calendar year, and you can apparently reuse the same authorization on subsequent trips. Since I had no plans to return to Mexico in 2004, I kept it simple and went with the one-time authorization. Next year I'll do the multi-entrance thing. Anyway, I paid that $52 entrance fee, and the guy gave me my entrance authorization paperwork and helped me fill out the flight plan for the flight to Guad. That was it. "Listo. Es todo."
At that point I called my father using my cell phone. Perfect signal, perfect clarity (Nokia 3100 GSM phone -- I was amazed at how good cell signal was everywhere I was in Mexico). I said I was on my way and would be at Guad around 3:30 local. I had arrived at Obregon right on time, around 9:15 PDT. My original "best case" itinerary had me leaving Obregon at 10:15 PDT, and I was wheels-up at 10:11 PDT. In and out of there in less than an hour. Easy!
As I headed southeast toward Culiacan, my route of flight took me closer to the water than before.
It was hazy but beautiful. At this point I was pretty much totally relaxed, had the ipod crankin', and was just enjoying the hell out of this. I think here I was heading down toward Los Mochis.
The scenery was like this for a couple of hours...inlet after inlet, river after river.
These are the hills to the east, somewhere between Obregon and Culiacan.
In places you see a lot of these striations of trees. I don't know what the deal was, but it looked neat.
The sun was almost directly overhead, but it was still hazy.
At this point I was several miles inland again, but looking out at the Sea of Cortez you could see a couple of good sized islands rising out of the water right off the coast.
This photo was taken right over Culiacan, which is another huge city.
This shot was supposed to show the shape of the airspace where Culiacan and Mazatlan sectors meet. It's kind of a neat shape. From Obregon, I contacted Los Mochis approach, which handed me off to Culiacan approach. Culiacan had me report over the station, and then requested that I report 50 DME southeast. At that point they handed me over to Mazatlan, and it was the same process -- report over the station, then report 50 DME.
There were some cool shadows on the water from the clouds.
Here I'm coming up on Mazatlan.
Looks like a pretty touristy place.
I've heard mixed reviews about the airport at Mazatlan, that some people had been discouraged from flying small planes in there. We'll see. Someday maybe I'll drop in there and check it out.
Crappy shot through the haze. The port and "islands" off Mazatlan.
Lots of large bodies of water just onshore down here.
It started getting a lot greener down here.
Large inlets and rivers all over the place.
A mountain off in the distance to the east.
Looking southeast toward Tepic. It was a little overcast but the clouds were high. Despite the haze and crappy photos, the visibility was about 30 to 40 miles.
Looked like a little cloud bank forming off the coast.
At this point I was about 50 miles out of Tepic, heading due southeast.
I was still "fighting" headwinds. The groundspeed varied between 162 knots and 175 knots or so.
I was about an hour out of Guadalajara and I had almost two hours of fuel remaining, running nice and efficient at 9.2 gallons per hour. Everything's happy engine-wise.
By the way, at this point I was using the ONC chart for landmarks and airports, but what was very helpful was the Jeppesen IFR kit and its IFR charts. Great for seeing distances between stations, and seeing much of the route and the essentials at a small scale.
I took a bunch of photos looking south along the coast, thinking I was seeing Puerto Vallarta, but visibility wasn't good enough to see it from where I was. Vallarta is the next bay south of here.
It was here near Tepic that I started cutting inland toward toward Guadalajara.
Off to the east there was a minor cloud buildup that almost looked like snow on a mountain.
The photos don't do it justice, the flight over Tepic was gorgeous. The area is all green, and you start seeing some volcanoes and cool stuff.
I can't put my finger on it, but something about Tepic looked extremely appealing to me. It just looks like beautiful countryside, and I assume the views of the volcano are probably awesome.
On my left I saw this crater-ish lake.
There was one on the right as well.
Ok, not too much further to go and we'll be in Guad.
This area between Tepic and Guadalajara was absolutely gorgeous. It was reminiscent of flying over the Grand Canyon and the mountains in California. The colors in the landscape were gorgeous. Again, the photos through the haze don't do it justice.
When I reached Guadalajara it was like -- BAM! Talk about a big city.
I had managed to send my father a few emails enroute on my cell phone -- while over major cities like Culiacan and Mazatlan I had excellent signal, even at 9500'. I sent Jen a quick "hi honey" text message over Mazatlan, and I sent my father an email with my updated ETA at Guadalajara. I was amazed that cell signal was so strong and reliable down there -- but it goes along with everything I've been told, that the U.S. is basically in the dark ages cell phone wise.
As I got closer to Guadalajara, I started making radio calls on 123.45 -- I told my father to bring his handheld transceiver to the airport and monitor that frequency. I started announcing my position from 80 miles out, but he said he never ended up hearing me. By the time I got close I was talking to tower, and he did hear me make my calls on that freq. Anyway, I touched down at MMGL right on time, at 3:30pm.
After landing at Guadalajara the controller instructed me on where to park the plane. I shut down among a handful of Cessnas and twin engine piston and jets on the ramp. One lone military dude came up, spoke no English, and asked a few simple questions -- registration, type of aircraft, my name, where I departed. He scribbled this info on his tattered note pad (as if it mattered), and that was it. I wandered around looking for any sort of "GA" stuff. It was kinda weird...I couldn't find the exit at first. The GA building is around the corner past the fire station, so you have to walk clear across the ramp to find it. After a little confusion I found my father, who they wouldn't let onto the ramp. I went back out to the plane, unloaded, tied it down, covered it, and that was that. What was really confusing at first was where to go to turn in the flight plan. Long story short, my father helped me find it, I turned in the paperwork, and we left the airport. Hope the plane's still there in a few days... The ramp seems pretty secure there, consider how hard it was to find my way OFF the field, let alone on.