Tooele was my first choice for the gas stop on Friday (thank you AirNav).
Tried stopping there last year but the fuel pump was INOP so we made an
unplanned trip to Ogden and made up for it by having lunch there.

And as I understand it Tooele is an unstaffed airport with damned little
other than a gas pump and a portapotty. Anybody got a friend in Tooele that
we can call on Thursday to see if the gas pump is working?

The reason I want Tooele instead of Wells is that Wells puts the route
directly over the center of Salt Lake. I generally get a pucker factor when
I'm out of gliding distance from solid earth and Tooele puts you around the
bottom end of the lake.

Sounds like a good plan for Day 1. Let's see who gets there first. We
stayed at the Day's Inn two years ago.

Same price this year as last -- $60 for those who fly in. And the steak
house attached is absolutely excellent. I'm going to make reservations for
Day's Inn (307.324.6615) and cancel them by 6 pm if we can't make it for
some reason.


I'll have to do some more AirNav research and see what the trade off might
be for a single gas stop between RWL and IOW. At the moment, Creighton,
NE (6KY) looks reasonable. The last two years were in rental birds on a
wet rate so it didn't matter where we bought gas. This year, however, it
will pay to shop around for 100LL.

The delta for fuel price between Rawlins and Torrington is about 70 cents a
gallon, so figure how many gallons you will burn between Tooele and Rawlins.
I'll probably have twenty gallons in the tanks when I get to Rawlins, so
I'll put in ten more at Rawlins and 35 or so in Torrington.

Creighton would have been a WONDERFUL stop for me but they stopped carrying
autogas. Talked to the owner of the tank farm yesterday and he said he put
in 800 gallons of cargas and hadn't sold half of it in 11 months. He used
to use it on the tractor on the farm next door but got a new diesel tractor
and has no use for cargas any more.


Yep, it's pretty early to be planning the return home. We're planning to
leave Saturday morning and try getting back with one overnight stay, maybe
in ScottsBluff. Of course, the afternoon buildups over the Sierras may
force us to stay the night somewhere in Nevada.

I've got that EAA annual meeting on Saturday morning or I'd be launching
early with you. Trust me, you don't want to stay in Scottsbluff. No
courtesy car and no motel pickups last time I was there, and it is a LOOOOng
cab ride to town. The only WORSE places for getting to town are Rock
Springs and Rapid City.

More better Ainsworth, Alliance or Torrington if you can. If you get to
Torrington, there is a Chinese takeout place (only Chinese in town) that
makes the best Crab Rangoon I've ever had. Torrington for another reason.
The Nebraska panhandle is famous for morning low clouds and fog. I can't
count the hours I've wasted sitting on the ground waiting for the morning
scud to burn off. Torrington is generally west enough to be out of it.

Jim

Jim