Delaware River

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These are the times that try men's souls; the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph .The American Crisis written by Thomas Paine,

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Within a day of its publication in Philadelphia, General Washington ordered it to be read to all of his troops. It encouraged the soldiers and improved their tolerance of their difficult conditions. On the morning of December 25, 1776 Washington ordered his army to prepare three days' food, and issued orders that every soldier be outfitted with fresh flints for their muskets. Washington, along with commanders John Sullivan, Nathaneal Green, John Glover and Henry Knox crossed the Delaware River with 2,400 troops, 18 cannons, baggage, and about 50-75 horses. They crossed at McKonkey's Ferry Inn (NJ).

The upper Delaware River tour.

The day wasn't perfect, but it was the most perfect day this year. Temperatures were close to 60°F, clear blue skies and gentle winds. I was surprised that none of my students had contacted me for a lesson, which meant Sally and I had some time to go out and play.

I arrived at the hangar close to 10:00am. She burped after 30 pulls and passed all of her preflight checks. I removed the cold weather baffle covering the oil cooler and cleaned the canopy with the remainder of my Plexus. Then I pulled her out into the warming sun.

The winter weather had kept me out of the seat for awhile. I had just a tinge of "strangeness" so reached for the checklist. Once I turned the key all was familiar again. We taxied to the ramp area to watch airplanes land as we waited for the Rotax to warm up to 122°F. Other pilots took advantage of the flying weather too. It was a busy day at the Quakertown Airport.

I had a new glitch during takeoff. My DSAB intermittently failed during the roll eliminating my primary airspeed indication. It would go dark, give a DSAB failure message then reset, only to fail again 5 seconds later. Fly the airplane, fly the airplane, fly the airplane. A DSAB reconfiguration in flight resolved the issue.

Where I started.

It was a good flight. I reached the Delaware River about where General Washington had crossed. It didn't look that impressive from 2000', but then I wasn't in a tiny boat on ice swollen water. We turned north and followed the river's meanderings up through the gap. I left the river there (remembering my time spent swimming in the river at Camp Hagan near Shawnee on the Delaware). We turned west following the valley north of Allentown. We turned south again to pass through the Lehigh Gap and got a good view of Slatington, where I took my first flights as a student pilot.

Then back to KUKT for landings. I got 3 turns in the pattern, but nothing to be too proud of. My best was a 4 out 5 (got a squeak but landed long). Of course, being a Sunday afternoon on a beautiful day meant I had an FBO full of judges to grade my attempts. Just perhaps one of them might offer an opinion on my performance. Sally flew well.

Video Notes: Delaware River

I used the Video Properties menu to adjust the "Z" rotation to correct the 3° wing mount attachment angle. I then added a slight zoom to remove the crop gaps on the corners of the video. This adjustment is most noticeable during take off helping to provide a level horizon. I also experimented with adjusting for a faster time but every bump and jitter was magnified. Instead I chose to edit out "boring" footage to keep the video under my target of ten minutes.