Today was one of the coolest days of my flying experience - I took my wife flying! Yesterday out of the blue my wife, Nadia, asked if I could fly her to Salem to visit my uncle. This is a dream come true because I had expected at least a year to pass before she would be willing to fly with me. My plan was to take her up early in the morning on a perfectly calm day to make sure things were as smooth and perfect as possible. The forecast for today was for clouds at 2,000 feet and afternoon winds of 10+ mph. Not exactly what I was hoping for on our first flight.

We got ready about one-half hour ahead of schedule this morning and decided to just leave early - probably the excitement of the flight. As I preflighted the 170 Nadia asked a number of questions which I thoroughly enjoyed answering. I had expected her to be nervous but instead she actually seemed interested. As we departed the wind was blowing at about 6mph which required a slight x-wind correction but not enough for a passenger to notice. So far the morning could not be going any better.

As we gained altitude, Nadia commented about the fancy homes below whose owners had cut down all the trees surrounding their homes - I guess people don't like trees. I was glad she was enjoying the view. We could only climb to about 1,500 feet due to low cloud cover which made it easy to see the countryside passing below. The trip down to Salem was fairly smooth and uneventful aside from the GPS quitting due to low battery power about three-quarters of the way there. The Salem tower cleared us for a right downwind approach to runway 34. We were landing with a 7mph x-wind. I really wanted this first landing to be perfect so Nadia would gain confidence in my flying ability and be more apt to fly with me in the future. I'm not too great at wheel landings and when they go bad I bounce like crazy; that would be a terrible experience for Nadia's first landing with me at the controls. As I flared for landing, I debated with myself weather or not to attempt a wheel landing. At the last second I decide to go for at and made a nice upwind wheel first wheel landing. I quickly set the tail down and taxied toward the parking area - everything was going better than I had expected. The following picture was taken at the Salem airport after tying down the 170.

We ended up having a great visit with my Uncle who give Nadia some useful advice on a business venture she is starting. We were also able to spend some time with my cousins, who I wish I saw more often, before returning after lunch around 2:00pm.

By 2:00pm the wind had increased to around 10mph blowing at greater than 45 degrees to the runway. I've flown a number of times in similar winds but as I said earlier, I was hoping for calmer winds for my first flight with my wife. The Lord must have guided my hands because I made a near perfect tail-up departure. In fact, it was smoother than most of my calm wind departures. Unfortunately, that was the only smooth part of our return trip. Due to the increasing wind and warm afternoon air, we had a fair amount of turbulence. Nadia did great although I could see she didn't feel all that great.

After landing we ran into my flight instructor which was a blessing as Nadia had not yet met him. We looked at his Cardinal while Nadia asked more questions. She even asked if she could go for a ride in his plane sometime to draw a comparison! While walking back to our hangar, Nadia said she thought flying was boring which I took as a huge blessing. I was worried she would be stressed about flying and not want to go up again. Instead, I saw a lovely woman who does not have a passion for flying but who was confident enough in my ability to be board. This is a blessing because although my flying was OK, the weather was not all that great and I was visibly stressed talking with the tower in Salem. (Up until today's flight, Hillsboro and Eugene are the only towered airports I've visited and I have not visited them enough to feel comfortable on the radio.) I'm really looking forward to our next flight. Hopefully it will be in smooth air to an airport I'm familiar with.