A rare treat and experience this weekend as I flew with Roger. Who he? He The Master of the Piper Cub, for building, piloting, air-show performing and all-round aviation buff…but a Piper Cub aficionado without any dispute. And known for it nationally. The story? Roger and Jim had purchased the remnants of a Piper Vagabond PA-15. These aircraft are quite rare, built by Piper, out of nearby Lock Haven PA and only 222 still registered to fly. The airplane is smaller than the famous Cub, but the 65 hp Continental engine will drive the craft to 102 mph. Roger (with occasional ‘help’ from Jim) completely rebuilt and re-equipped the PA-15, restoring it to perfection – and then adding hand-held radio’s and a GPS! Its side-by-side seating configuration makes for pleasant flying, as I found on Sunday.
I first flew with Jim, always fun – a great pilot.
But questions about it’s handling brought Roger to the cockpit, with me in the right-seat. Now this is rare. For anyone to fly with The Master is rare. For me to accompany him on this flight, as we completed several take-offs and landings, both on the grass-strip and the runway, was special. Wanting to learn how I can add to my tail-dragger skills I watched him closely, while trying not to look like I was watching him closely. What a treat. You will always learn when you sit next to and watch a Master at work. I did.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 25th, 2007 at 9:10 pm and is filed under Aviation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.