Short Final: In The Eye Of The Beholder

My old Narco Escort 110 could navigate and communicate, but not both at the same time. That led to some interesting conversations with controllers.

I was just stretching my legs to add VFR flight following to my toolkit, but rather than relying on VORs (only available part-time) I still preferred to navigate in a straight line, setting a heading and picking prominent landmarks along the way. On one trip, I was following my best dead reckoning course with my finger on the sectional and flying from one big lake, to a large highway intersection, to a north-south powerline, and so on.

As I checked in with the next controller, he asked, “What navaid are you using?” I answered, “Right now, it looks like a prison with a river just to the south.”