My Third Solo X-Country

CareBear wrote:

Good for you. They are fun.

The leg to CTJ was kinda long (70 minutes) but it was relaxing. Flying to
BHM from CTJ was rather interesting. The sun was shining bright right at
me. The little sun visor in the plane really didn't help. Since I couldn't
see clearly, I really had to rely on the instruments.

A couple of things here. I wear a baseball cap pulled down low. And get
a good pair of glasses. But most importantly, let ATC be your eyes. You
didn't say if you had dialed into ATC for VFR flight following. That is
key. You've got to look out of the plane, you have to see. It is really
important. Fender benders at 4500' make the newspaper. And that is quite
bad! :^)

That call sounds like ...
"Podunk Approach N12345"
they come back.
"Podunk Approach N12345 VFR from Kabc to Kxyz at [say altitude]
requesting flight following."

Short and sweet.

Then dial in the xpdr code and you are good to go. Always acknowledge
the calls back.


I still get a little nervous when I have to talk to Approach/Tower, etc. at
Class C airports. I guess it will just take time and more communicating
before I really get the hang of it. There is a great little book that
really helps me with this. It's called VFR Radio Procedures in The USA.
I'm sure most of you are familiar with it.

You'll learn to say more in less over time. It starts to sound like
"Podunk Approach N12345 inbound with Charlie"

And that's it. It is daunting at first. You don't want to sound like a
dope but people in this biz are pretty cool. They know. We've all been
there.

KC