Cross Country Champ: Back to Virginia

After almost two months of having fun flying all around South Carolina, it was time to head back to Virginia. I was worried about being able to leave as a few flights I had been planning to go on the previous weekend were cancelled due to heavy smoke from forest fires in North Carolina and Georgia, which was lingering. I actually did one loop around the pattern at Aiken with a CFI on one of those days. The visibility was reported as 5 miles, but the runway had already disappeared into the smoke on the base to final turn. We landed immediately and decided to go another time.

Fortunately, when it came time for me to head back to Virginia, it ended up being a perfect day. It was sunny with fairly light winds (though of course it was a headwind). Knowing that the smoke was worse to the west, I elected for a route that would take me east around Charlotte's Class B airspace. The only area of smoke I encountered was an area with thick haze between Charlotte and Greensboro, NC. Visibility went down to somewhere between 5 and 10 NM. It cleared up by the time I got to my fuel stop at Shiloh Airport in Reidsville, NC (KSIF). The rest of the flight was uneventful. I landed and put the plane away shortly before sunset. It was a great ending to a wonderful time in South Carolina!