Once the maintenance was finished, I was tempted to pack the plane and fly off straightaway. Prudence dictated a few short flights to check for anything loose, oil or fluid leaks, or electrical problems. Where would I go in South Florida for an extended test flight, I asked myself. Jim Walsh had an excellent suggestion: ‘How about Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Center?’
Now that the Space Shuttle program has closed down, NASA allows private pilots to observe the Space Coast from the air, and to ‘shoot the shuttle runway’ by flying along the entire five-kilometre landing strip at 100 feet, and then past the massive shuttle assembly building. It was a pretty cool thing to do. I was feeling good, and was now ready to venture forth. And who doesn’t love rockets?
Act iii
‘Man who catch fly with chopstick accomplish anything.’
MR MIYAGI, THE KARATE KID (1984)
27.
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
‘Don’t just fly, soar.’
DUMBO, DUMBO (1941)
My route out of Florida took the Southern Sun over the Gulf of Mexico and Tyndall Air Force Base, where an air-traffic controller gave me permission to fly through his airspace. After a few minutes he radioed a warning that sent a surge of excitement through my body. ‘Three X-ray Papa, traffic at your level,’ he said. ‘A pair of F-22 Raptors will cross and pass you.’
The two planes, the most modern fighter jets in the world, zoomed in front of the Sun from right to left. It felt awesome to see such powerful aircraft in action from the air. Then another two flew past. Just before they disappeared out of sight, I snapped a photo – but it turned out to be two blobs and the inside of the windshield. Either it was the worst photo of the trip, or their stealth technology was that good.
I continued along the coast and landed at Ferguson Airport, a civil airport just north-west of the Naval Air Station Pensacola. This is the national military aviation headquarters, and they have a museum that celebrates nearly 100 years of ocean-based flying – from seaplanes and flying boats to planes that launch from the decks of aircraft carriers. The entry foyer had an imposing floor-to-ceiling picture of an aircraft carrier, and an audacious caption: ‘90,000 tons of diplomacy, anywhere, anytime’. Only in America! There were some great displays, including the first seaplane to cross the Atlantic, a cutaway Catalina, and various histories of a century of naval aviation.
It was here that an idea came to me: if an aviator is someone who flies a plane, then someone engaged in naval aviation would surely be a naviator. And if someone who goes around the world is a circumnavigator, then circling the globe in a flying boat must be a circumnaviation. (Are you still with me?) Finally, if the Southern Sun did complete a round-the-world journey, not only would I have made up a new word, I would also be the world’s first solo circumnaviator!
It was a short flight along the coast to New Orleans, a city I had wanted to visit for many years. The closer I got, the more disparate the coastline became. Mudflats seemed to meander in all directions, and more water came to dominate the scene. At the city’s secondary airport, New Orleans Lakefront, the runway was built on reclaimed land that jutted out into Lake Pontchartrain.
After a night spent wandering through the old town, eating gumbo and listening to music wafting from bars along the streets, breakfast the next morning at my French Quarter hotel was different to every other on the journey thus far. There was no flight plan to file. I didn’t even know my final destination. The Southern Sun would follow the great Mississippi River north, and spend the night wherever she ended up.
From the airport, I followed high-tension power lines across Lake Pontchartrain to the river’s mouth. The waterway was busy. Thousands of barges lined the banks, and were rafted together and pushed by river tugs.
The first 200 kilometres to Baton Rouge was wall-to-wall with industry, mainly oil refineries. I had been told that 85 per cent of the United States’ fuel passes through there. If the river levee breaks, America will be redeploying horses and carts for a while, I thought.
The Ole Miss isn’t just the longest river in the US; it carries a great legacy of folklore and emotion. The first sandbar I saw covered in trees immediately made me think of Tom and Huck, the heroes of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, meandering down the river on a raft or small boat and pulling up at night to sleep among the trees.
I’d loved Huck Finn as a kid. I read the book and recalled the 1939 black-and-white movie – starring a young Mickey Rooney – being the Saturday matinee on television. I had dreamed for years of building a raft at the source of the Mississippi and floating down to the sea. That was unlikely to happen, so instead I would do it upstream in a raft that flew.
The source of the river is Lake Itasca, which is 1400 feet above sea level. It is amazing to think that a river that is 4000 kilometres long only falls 1400 feet before reaching the sea. If there were a bike path all the way, it would be a very gentle uphill ride from New Orleans to the source.
After a few sweeping bends, I saw a biplane doing what I thought was aerobatics. I was at first envious, but soon realised it was a crop duster, one of many I would see along the way. Five hours and many turns later, I landed at the very large Memphis International Airport, in Tennessee. Within ten minutes I was in an airport courtesy car – a common service for pilots at US airports – and soon I was pulling up at Graceland. Outside the house are the King’s two 1960s private jets, the Lisa-Marie and the Hound Dog II. I am not a huge Elvis Presley fan, but I admire the influence and effect of cultural icons. And shagpile carpet. While it was very dated and at times kitsch, Elvis’s house wasn’t a palatial mansion, and felt well lived in by a large family. I left impressed.
I got back in the Sun and headed upstream, following every bend of the river, wondering where I’d stop for the night. Reelfoot Lake had been recommended as a place to see, if not visit. In the early 1800s, an earthquake in the area caused land next to the Mississippi to subside. According to Native Indian lore, an angry spirit stamped his foot next to the river, causing it to flood. A lake was formed – the only natural lake in Tennessee. The local tribes named it Angry Spirit Foot Lake. From the air, it does indeed look like a foot. But in the 1810s they had no way of getting up high enough to see what it looked like, so how did they know?
I found a small runway inside a national park between the river and the lake, and decided it would make a nice campsite. The Sun was the only plane at the airfield, and there was no accommodation anywhere nearby. I broke out an emergency beef stew stowed for the Atlantic crossing and settled in for a peaceful night next to the lake. A swarm of insects descended on my private camp. It was all but impossible to sit still, let alone sleep, and I was forced to spend the night in the cramped pilot’s seat with the lights turned off. Rather than sitting in the seat facing forward, I worked out that if I lay on my back with my feet on the rear shelf and my head against the dashboard, I could sleep ‘astronaut style’. It was sort of comfortable.
Breakfast was served under the wing. Having raided the emergency provisions kit, I now rediscovered all sorts of goodies, including delicious porridge bars from Scotland. No one makes stodge as magnificently as the Scots!
The Sun took off at 10 a.m., having waited a couple of hours due to fog, which gave me time to go for a walk in the national park. Once we were up in the sky, the weather was clear for a while, but the cloud got lower as we ventured upstream until it wasn’t safe to fly any further. For most pilots that would have meant turning back or looking for an airport. But I simply flew a loop to check there were no obstructions on the water, and soon landed on the river and headed for a bank behind an erosion barrier, which would shelter us from the current. I nosed the Sun up next to a sand bank and tied her to a tree. Ah, the serenity, I thought. Not a bad spot to wait out the low cloud.
A boat came around a bend. I listened carefully for banjos, but soon the distinctive sound of a two-stoke motor was drowning out the serenity. Swamp people?
&
nbsp; Three men and a woman, all adorned in camouflage, pulled up next to me in a shallow-bottom motorboat. They were residents of the local town of Perryville on a weekend fishing trip, which they said they hadn’t quite got to as yet because they kept meeting interesting folk. I realised I had passed them overhead earlier as they sat midstream next to a two-man Canadian canoe; it turned out they were having a chat with a Boston couple who were navigating the Mississippi from source to sea, and were eighty days in. That was certainly living out a dream.
They offered me one of the beers they were enjoying and the use of their camp while I waited for the weather to improve. It was a nice offer but I didn’t want to leave the Sun. Plus, the sun was still in the east. Nor do I drink beer. I was thirteen when I saw Deliverance, and remain subconsciously terrified of heading off with strangers downriver.
An hour later the cloud lifted. I was soon flying past the Perryville airfield when I heard an unusual call over the radio, which sounded like it was a conversation between someone on the ground and a student pilot. ‘Ah, I’ve just realised I forgot to set the altimeter before you left,’ the voice said. ‘It looks like you’re at 1500 feet, so turn the knob until the small hand is between one and two and the big hand is on five.’ I hoped it wasn’t some poor guy’s first solo flight!
While the Mississippi was a majestic vein of economic activity, it wasn’t beautiful. There were many barges on the river. South of Memphis, the banks were marred by a lot of industrial plants that looked like refineries. North of the city, the riverside equipment was mainly digging stuff up – harvesting sand, perhaps.
The further north we flew, though, that started to change. Seeing new topography is always satisfying, and some hills and cliffs appeared. As I neared St Louis, Missouri, I came across the first river lock, and the sign of modern riverfront communities. St Louis was the last city on the navigable stretch of river before locks were built. Geographically the heart of America, it must have been an impressive commercial hub in the era before the locks, which allowed the trading vessels to continue further upstream.
To my great appreciation, St Louis air-traffic control cleared the Southern Sun to follow the river through the airport’s airspace. The route took me right past the city’s famous Gateway Arch. As we passed to the north, I saw the first floating marina complex on the river, and realised there was something I hadn’t seen much of thus far: pleasure craft.
All of a sudden there was marina after marina. Some cruisers and even yachts were out sailing. The locks made the river wider and calmer. The environment was prettier, too. Treacherous-looking sandbars were replaced by islands, which boaters could enjoy on weekends – and upon which young trouble-makers apparently spent nights.
My lunchtime destination was Hannibal, the birthplace of author Sam Clemens, whom the world would come to know as Mark Twain. I overflew the town to take a look. A big paddle-steamer was getting ready to embark, so I circled again for a photo and noticed a boat ramp right in front of the town.
I circled a couple more times to estimate the ramp’s width, and judged that the Sun should just be able to fit. I landed on the river and taxied towards the ramp, but I didn’t want to enter the marina until a pick-up truck and trailer had moved on. The ramp was steep and the Sun would need speed to get up it. Once she started, it would be hard to stop or turn.
Sadly, the guy on the ramp decided to stand and watch me. He was obviously wondering why a seaplane was going around in circles on the water. After twenty minutes another person – who turned out to be a pilot – went and told him I was probably waiting for him to move, so he finally got out of the way.
It was now after 4 p.m. and I prayed the Twain exhibits weren’t shut. The collection was spread across the town. I hadn’t studied his books at school – I’d read them at the time, though, and again in later years – and didn’t realise that the characters were drawn from his childhood experiences and friends. The houses of people who inspired Huck and Becky were marked, and Twain’s own house had a white paling fence. A museum, which was open till 5 p.m., had a treasure-trove of knick-knacks, including Twain’s river-boat captain’s licence and fifteen Norman Rockwell paintings commissioned in the 1930s for an illustrated edition of his two adventure books. There were reissued hardbacks of this edition for sale in the gift shop, and I wanted to buy one. But books are heavy and I was travelling light. No souvenir shopping was possible in the Sun – which unfortunately meant Tim and Jack also missed out on some Elvis sunglasses from Memphis, and I wouldn’t get to hear their polite but insincere thanks.
I made it to the town’s last Twain exhibit by closing time and then went for a walk down the main street. There were many empty shops, victims of the financial crisis and competition from out-of-town shopping malls. But there were also signs of hope. A fairly new cinema had been built, a theatre had been restored, and new eateries were opening up. In a groovy little cafe I saw my first real coffee machine in two weeks, and thoroughly enjoyed a strong latte. Back at the marina I met some members of the local boat club, and a pilot who helped clear people and vehicles away so the Sun could taxi down the cobblestones – a first, apparently – and into the Mississippi.
It was now after 7 p.m., which gave me just under an hour to fulfil the next part of my Huck Finn adventure. I was determined to find an island on the river where I could sleep the night. It didn’t take long to locate a suitable spot: an island in the lee of another island, where the current wouldn’t drag the Sun away while I slept.
Spending a night on the banks of the Mississippi was magical. I had to sleep in the Sun again to avoid insects, but I loved cooking and eating dinner on the sand bank. The river trip was an adventure I’d wanted to do for a long time. I drifted off to sleep feeling pretty contented. Florida, just three days past, was already a distant memory.
The river dropped about 15 centimetres overnight, leaving the Sun stuck firmly on the sand. There was no point panicking – it wasn’t going to change much in the next thirty minutes. Besides, breakfast hadn’t been served. After a coffee and an oat bar, I twisted and wrangled the Sun into two inches of water. It wasn’t deep enough to float the boat but provided a little bit of lubrication against the sandy riverbed. I got into the cockpit, turned on the engine and tried to skid across the sand. Even at full power, she wouldn’t budge.
I got out, grabbed the tail and pulled her back and forth to try to release the hull from the sand. It became even more tightly wedged. Was I going to have to get a tug to tow me out?
What I needed was a lighter aircraft with the same amount of power. I had a cunning plan. Standing next to the open cockpit in a few inches of water, with my pants rolled up to my knees, I leaned in and started the engine. Holding on with all my strength, I slowly increased the power and rocked the Sun with my hips to loosen her from the sand, keeping a hand on the throttle in case. After a nervous minute, she moved forward just a little. I reduced the power and jumped into my seat. As I upped the power and kicked the rudder from left to right, she jiggled forward inch by inch until she suddenly broke free of the riverbed and was floating. I cut the power and took a huge gulp of air. Thank goodness!
The early morning was a lovely time to fly upriver. The air was smooth, with no heat-induced turbulence, and the flying was calm and relaxing. I saw many flocks of birds in formation and quite a few boats that had also spent the night on the river. After refuelling at Tri-Township Airport, I turned east for the second time on the trip since leaving Sydney and set a course for Traverse City, a diversion of around 500 kilometres each way. This is a popular holiday spot on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, and home to the community-based State and Bijou theatres.
The cinemas are owned and operated by the Traverse City Film Festival, which was founded by Michael Moore. The famous documentary-maker chooses all the films shown at the cinemas (which is also my favourite job at the Sun Theatre, so kept doing it all through the trip). Built in 1916, the State has been meticulously restored and is run
with much love. A lean mix of staff and volunteers work year round to keep the cinemas going.
The manager, Kristen, showed me around and chatted. Jim, the projectionist, is an accomplished organist, and performs before screenings. I wasn’t aware of the unique ‘Bijou by the Bay’ before I arrived. It was originally built as a museum and gallery in a park on the edge of Lake Michigan, and was leased from the city by the film festival and converted into a smaller cinema because the demand for moving-image storytelling was so strong.
I’d never seen a cinema so wonderfully plonked inside another building in such a fashion. The result was a very cute venue with a rare vibrancy both inside and on the facing street, where there were interesting and good-quality restaurants, cafes and bars – and not a franchise outlet in sight.
I could see parallels between our Sun Theatre in Melbourne and the State in Traverse City. Both had been abandoned and were surrounded by run-down shopping strips. The resurrection of each cinema was part of the revitalisation of the area at a time when many people were questioning the relevance of cinema in the face of online entertainment and DVDs. These parallel successes in Victoria and Michigan illustrated that a cinema can be the cornerstone of a lively and economically sustainable ecosystem.
The next morning I considered flying direct to Minneapolis, which would have saved me a day by avoiding a big stretch of the river. As tempted as I was, I couldn’t bring myself to take the shortcut. I had committed to myself to fly the Mississippi and that’s what I was going to do.
I backtracked to the point where I had turned east, refuelling at Tri-Township Airport. I then continued north, following every turn of the river, which was becoming more and more picturesque, to Minneapolis, the sixteenth-largest city in the United States. After landing at its medium-sized airport, I quickly packed up and got to a nondescript hotel by dusk. A huge AMC cinema glared across the street, so I walked towards the foyer to see what was showing. After the previous day’s wonderful experiences, though, I couldn’t bring myself to cross the threshold of the commercial, soulless monolith, so I had dinner alone and got an early night.
Voyage of the Southern Sun Page 20
