Journal-11

Guam

Thursday, 05 July 2007

We had mechanical difficulty on our flight to Guam .The rpm on the engine kept changing and prop was cycling to set power. We manage to make the 2000 miles across the water and safely land after dark.

However, during taxi to the ramp, something came off of the taxi way and hit the prop. There was a dint, the size of a quarter at the tip of the prop. I thought, we will be stuck in Guam for few a weeks to get parts shipped from US for repairing the aircraft.We also had one magneto failure.

I called my good friend John Ellenberg to get advice and trouble shoot the problem. We needed to get a prop governor, a new prop and fix the magneto.

I made several calls to US to get a new prop and prop governor. Due to the shipping size of the prop, and time zone deference between US and Guam , over night shipping was 8 day delivery. Fortunately, we found a maintenance shop and fixed the prop within two days. We also found a loss injector that was causing our mechanical problem.

Joaquin, the shop manager from Freedom Air, was really a sharp guy and found the points not opening in the magneto and reset it without using any gages by eyeballing the gap. Our prop was repaired with one of Ken’s mechanic who had 5 wives and 47 children. He also found a lose injector that could be the cause of our rpm change.

We used Ray Crenshaw (Guam Flight Services)for our ground handling. He is an American who lives in Guam . He overstates the work he needs to do for you, and tries to get as much money as he can. He arranged our fuel for 10 dollars a gallon plus 300 dollars for his commission, in addition to 550 for his handling fee. Anyone flying to Guam should avoid this handler. Later on, we learned the Freedom Air is also a handler with very reasonable prices (7 dollars per gallon for fuel).

Look mom, no hand at 12000 feet

Tokyo

Thursday, 05 July 2007

We arrived at Nurita air port about 4 pm. Noevir Group was our handler and arranged all of our permits. They greeted us on arrival with their supper nice Japanese hospitality.

We had a 40 minutes train ride to Tokyo . It was nice to be in a different vehicle than an aircraft.

We will spend next two nights in Tokyo .

Hakodate , Japan

Saturday, 07 July 2007

We left Tokyo at 10 am and landed at Hakodate airport about 1 pm. Weather was good with a little rain on our departure.

This was a short flight. We left the airport and checked into our hotel. Hakodate is known for its fresh fish and we wanted to hit the town to experience the local culture and food. There was a mineral pool to soak your feed. The local people believe it has medical effect for your joins and soothing your feed that is considered your second heart.

I was finely able to convince Arshid to eat Sushi.

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