Flight Simulation:Floundering around with Ron Blehm

Background: After founding F.S Flight Club International back in 2003 I became known as the "Cub Flounder." In this column I host a feature flight for you all to try on your own time. This feature could take you anywhere; from rugged mountain flying in Alaska to flying big heavies in SE Asia, from commuter hops across Europe to amphibians around the Caribbean - one just never knows what we'll come across! Since starting our little club, we have grown into a real community which includes a web site and our own liveries, many of which you have been seeing in these features. You are certainly encouraged to use whatever add-ons you like and anything you picked up from the last feature may still help out for this round as we are staying in the South American Andes.

History: History: In the last feature we took some classic old propliners from Arequipa, Peru to La Paz, Bolivia - This is the sister feature for that flight. This time we will take some eager vacationers to Cuzco, nearby the home of the ancient Incas, Machu Piccu. For this flight we will use something a little more powerful, a little more like something you'd actually ride in: Dash 7, Dash 8, Saab 340, Jetstream-31, Beech 1900D, KingAir etc. I chose the Dash 7, repainted by one of our VA pilots for the Arequipa hub of Flight Club International Airways (www.toomuchfs.com). I loaded up the "Purple Inca" at noon from Arequipa and taxied toward the towering Misti volcano, ready for a westbound departure.

Routing: Having flown this flight many times for the Flight Club and our own VA, I knew the route well - Depart westbound...fly about 3 minutes on runway heading and turn to 360° (photo above, left). Continue climbing onto the 351 radial outbound (113.7). Enjoy the views during the 170 mile cruise...eventually dialing up the 114.90 VOR on both NAV radios. Having had ATC drive me into the mountains too many times I stay at a safe altitude until 10 miles from the VOR at which point I call up the Cuzco tower to get runway and ATIS info, then I enter a pattern (photo above, right) and land about 90 minutes after start-up (photo below, left), unless flying one of the bizjets (photo below, right)..

Once your vacationing patrons have deplaned and you have topped off the tanks (if needed), repeat the procedures (photo left, below). You will fly the same route to return to Arequipa, flying over the 113.70 VOR (photo center, below) to land on runway 9.

This is, obviously, a shorter feature and if you want I can make it longer by sharing with you my story of the very first flight I took into Cuzco: It was in FS2000, the mountains looked like the Egyptian pyramids and I was flying a new Dash-8 Q400. I got behind the power curve making the turn base-to-final and even with the throttles firewalled there wasn't enough air to grab and I piled into the dirt east of the airport (in FS2000 there wasn't a city built yet). I sincerely hope that does not happen to you! Enjoy!