Post by dalecaruso on Feb 25, 2007 10:54:10 GMT -5
The freight moves - even on Sunday.
After a delayed departure from Belem, due to the late arrival of a cargo ship from Hamburg, to attempt to not fall too far behind schedule we made a late evening departure to Tucurui. There we spent the night.
With clear skies and an easterly wind at 20, we depart Tucurui at 6am with a crew of 3 and 8,000 pounds of heavy equipment parts bound for Maraba - our final destination, or that’s what we thought.
Arrived Maraba around 6:40am. While the cargo master assisted with the unloading of the Cargo, My co-pilot (The “good Kid” - one of my ten daughters who thanks to her dad has developed a love of flight - real world flight) and I headed off for coffee at the local café.
While there, we were approached by a fellow, an archeologist and explorer he told us. He was interested in charting our aircraft to haul he and his four companions along with a ton of equipment and supplies to Ventilla.
Ventilla, we were told lies within the Nazca valley of Peru and is the is home to several major archeological sites. He was talking about a “map” and a “secret but wouldn’t elaborate.
Since he was paying in cold, hard cash; we didn’t feel the need to press for more details. In the independent cargo hauling business, you tend to go where the money takes you.
So after ordering sandwiches and a couple of large thermoses of coffee for the “in flight” food service we headed back to the airstrip to supervise the final off loading of our cargo, re-loading of the new freight, along with the refueling and visual check of the aircraft.
A stop at the flight service shack ... such as it was, we filed a flight plan and inquired about any available maps or charts of our destination. Other than an old Rand McNally map of Peru ... we were on our own.
Departed Maraba at 8:10am, with 20,762 pounds of fuel, a ton of cargo, 5 passengers, and our adventuresome crew of three.
We had expected the flight to last around seven hours, but made some pretty good time, arriving at 2:35 local time.
Flight details:
burned off a total of 9200 pounds of fuel
Flew economy settings ... holding RPMs to just over 2000 - lean mixture to 50%, pitch around 60
held the PPH to the recommended settings.
Including a few photos.... Would love to hang around and write some more, but need to get ready to head back home. Besides, we were just approached by a group that wanted to know if we could give them a lift to San Rafael, Peru. Told them it is slightly out of our way ... but they are willing to PAY ... CASH (really it isn’t and actually we had planned to stop there anyway to refuel.)
Well ... time to refill the thermoses and head back to the aircraft .... so, be well ... we’ll write when we can.
Dale
Maraba
In Flight
Here is Lake Titicaca, the second largest lake in South America
On final into Ventilla (7,546 foot plus turf strip) elevation: 13,123
After a delayed departure from Belem, due to the late arrival of a cargo ship from Hamburg, to attempt to not fall too far behind schedule we made a late evening departure to Tucurui. There we spent the night.
With clear skies and an easterly wind at 20, we depart Tucurui at 6am with a crew of 3 and 8,000 pounds of heavy equipment parts bound for Maraba - our final destination, or that’s what we thought.
Arrived Maraba around 6:40am. While the cargo master assisted with the unloading of the Cargo, My co-pilot (The “good Kid” - one of my ten daughters who thanks to her dad has developed a love of flight - real world flight) and I headed off for coffee at the local café.
While there, we were approached by a fellow, an archeologist and explorer he told us. He was interested in charting our aircraft to haul he and his four companions along with a ton of equipment and supplies to Ventilla.
Ventilla, we were told lies within the Nazca valley of Peru and is the is home to several major archeological sites. He was talking about a “map” and a “secret but wouldn’t elaborate.
Since he was paying in cold, hard cash; we didn’t feel the need to press for more details. In the independent cargo hauling business, you tend to go where the money takes you.
So after ordering sandwiches and a couple of large thermoses of coffee for the “in flight” food service we headed back to the airstrip to supervise the final off loading of our cargo, re-loading of the new freight, along with the refueling and visual check of the aircraft.
A stop at the flight service shack ... such as it was, we filed a flight plan and inquired about any available maps or charts of our destination. Other than an old Rand McNally map of Peru ... we were on our own.
Departed Maraba at 8:10am, with 20,762 pounds of fuel, a ton of cargo, 5 passengers, and our adventuresome crew of three.
We had expected the flight to last around seven hours, but made some pretty good time, arriving at 2:35 local time.
Flight details:
burned off a total of 9200 pounds of fuel
Flew economy settings ... holding RPMs to just over 2000 - lean mixture to 50%, pitch around 60
held the PPH to the recommended settings.
Including a few photos.... Would love to hang around and write some more, but need to get ready to head back home. Besides, we were just approached by a group that wanted to know if we could give them a lift to San Rafael, Peru. Told them it is slightly out of our way ... but they are willing to PAY ... CASH (really it isn’t and actually we had planned to stop there anyway to refuel.)
Well ... time to refill the thermoses and head back to the aircraft .... so, be well ... we’ll write when we can.
Dale
Maraba
In Flight
Here is Lake Titicaca, the second largest lake in South America
On final into Ventilla (7,546 foot plus turf strip) elevation: 13,123