The Valient Air Command museum at Titusville FL (KTIX) was hosting an open house at the museum with cars, RC planes, Military aircraft and food! KTIX is the closest airport to Cape Canaveral. I expected it to be pretty busy there. I got 5 hours time on the new cylinders so it was time for my first cross country after the engine work. We tried for a 10am takeoff from KPIE but the whole central FL was IFR in fog and low clouds... I haven't done a VRF flight plan in a long time so I filed one with the computer just to see if it actually worked. We decided to try the flight at 10:30 am and would turn around if it got too bad. Took off from KPIE, went thru KSPG airspace, around MacDill Air Force Base and on into central FL. Mostly had to stay about 800' up but nearing Lakeland we got up to 2000' and transitioned over KLAL. Went south of Orlando under their Class B and turned for KTIX. I expected fairly heavy traffic at KTIX but on the ADS-B didn't see much activity.
At 7 miles out called the tower for landing and was #1 for 36. You could see the Cape Canaveral Vehicle Assembly building across the river. I was going too fast and too high so had to stall it to get down. Perfect squeaker landing and taxied to the VAC museum. VAC has a very small ramp and it was filled with 5 SX300's and 5 RV's plus bunches of VAC warbirds. This guy with a vest (looked official) directed me to park next to a Warbird Jet. He welcomed us to the event and gave us lunch tickets! Wow, even free lunch! I attached a picture of the Q next to a jet that I'm not sure of the type?
We hit the three hangars with warbirds packed in. The cool part was there was many pilots stationed near the airplane they used to fly in the military. Complete with the war stories they had to tell! I could have spent more time listening to them. If you ever get a chance to visit the VAC museum, do it!
The RV's took off in a flight of 5, and ran their smoke on the way out. Shortly after, the SX300's took off and did a fly by with smoke on. Nice. The crowd was thinning so I figured we'd also leave. Filed a quick flight plan and fired up the Q. As we taxied to the end of Rwy 36 we could see a guy on the outside of the control tower watching us with Binoculars. Either he'd never seen a Q, or was bored, or had heard about how I fly... not sure anyway he watched us the whole time. Took off and kept it low, building speed until I got to the VAC area and then zoomed up and away.
Looking back I talked to 6 ATC facilities on the way over and back and did not get yelled at by any of them. It was a good day!
Dec 4 at 1:38 pm is the next SpaceX launch and we plan to be in the air over KTIX to watch the launch. You should join us!
Fly Safe,
Mike N3QP Q200
FlightAware path (free with ADS-B)
