In article ,
Erik wrote:

Not the sicko kind of cruising, either.

A friend of mine bought a house on some large property about
six miles (linearly) away from a towered airport with class D
five miles around it (one protrusion for approaches that I'm not
concerned with).

She's having a barn built and I'd like to fly over and take some
pictures, but this puts me just outside of the airspace and
somewhat inline with where aircraft come in, a somewhat popular
route to arrive from.

This is far enough away that I suspect most traffic is still at
upwards of 2000' or better. I've flown over and found her house,
but it always makes me nervous. Twitchy as a chipmunk in a cat
house. Well, not a cathouse, really, but still.

What's the safest way to do this? (Yes, my piloting is young yet,
but I'm still proud of it.)

Just call up the tower and tell them that you will be orbiting at 1500 (or
whatever altitude you pick), near the north (east, whatever) edge of their
airspace. Depending on the tower (i.e. whether they have radar or not),
they may give you a squawk code, or may not. They'll probably just advise
incomming and outgoing flights that you're there, and ask you to just
advise them when you're ready to depart the area.

If nothing else, it satisfies the "establish radio contact" rule, so you
don't have to worry about accidentally encroaching on their airspace and
being in violation.