I had the most delicious iced chai on Saturday, at Fluid Coffee Roasters in Michigan City, IN. When I picked it up, I could just sense it was going to be amazing. The spice blend was a dreamy perfection.
Sigh. Why have all the best chais I’ve ever had been far from home? Decorah in 2018, Kansas City in 2022, now this. Maybe the distance and occasion is part of the charm. And that it was cold—we were so hot when we got there!
I had the best avocado toast of my life too. It was on a “Chicago style” (??? what’s that?) bagel that was perfectly chewy, and just drenched in balsamic. Who knew I liked balsamic so much?
Ugh, it was amazing.
I definitely recommend Fluid Coffee Roasters!
So why were we in Michigan City? We were doing attempt #2 to fly there! We tried on May 18 with Eric but had to turn around and land in Gary because of low clouds over Michigan City. It obviously worked out this time! Although when we checked the weather that morning it called for low clouds and MVFR (marginal visual flight rules) flying conditions, so we were like “maybe it’s just that part of the lake?” and had a Gary back up plan again. It cleared up. Again, obviously.
Anyway! We took off just after 9:00, and it was already 85°. The Cessna 172 we fly doesn’t have AC (lol), and the vents don’t have (hot) outside air flowing through them until the plane is in the air. I immediately opened my vents all the way up and actually felt fine, until we landed and I had sweat through my shorts. Lovely. And that’s why I brought a dry washcloth with me to wipe sweat off my skin. I remembered how sweaty you realize you are once the plane stops moving.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. We hugged Lake Michigan to fly over to Michigan City. We were mindful to stay gliding distance from the shore, to stay under the Chicago Bravo (we flew around 2,500 MSL), and out of temporary flight restrictions (TFR).
There was an active TFR for the Chicago NASCAR qualifiers on the way out and back, and a Cubs one on the way back.
We listened to Chicago Approach to pay attention for any other aircraft cruising along the lake, but we didn’t see anyone. And of course, we lost WiFi and didn’t have live data on our iPads, so we just used our eyeballs.
But it was chill and we enjoyed the cruise and looking at the lakeshore, and boats out in the water.
As we were flying along the shore I could see how you’d easily get disoriented by just following a curved shoreline if you didn’t have navigational aids or weren’t paying attention. Since we started going south it still felt like we were traveling south, even though we turned east and then a bit north. The wind changes were big clues—we started with a headwind and ended with a tailwind.
We actually flew into Michigan airspace, then turned back to do our approach to the Michigan City airport in Indiana. Because of the direction of the runway we were landing on (200°) and due to that airport being a skydiving airport, we wanted to come in with a straight approach, rather than do a teardrop over the runway to enter the pattern.
The skydivers weren’t out yet though, thankfully, and there was just a plane doing pattern work.
We landed, parked, used the bathroom in the FBO (fixed based operator), then called an Uber into town. We got our drinks and ate, walked around a bit, trying to stay in the shade and not melt, then Lyfted back (our Lyft driver thought it was very cool we flew there)!
We did some flight planning in the FBO, and started preflight. The skydiving plane was operating, so we waited for them to land before we headed toward the runway. We’ve always been cautious around skydivers, but are even more now since the last time we took off at a skydiving field. The skydiving plane actually loaded up and took off right before us, so we knew we were in the clear—it takes them a bit of time to get to elevation to offload the meatbags. I mean, skydivers.
We left around 1:00 and the airspace was a bit busier on the way back. It would have been a great time to have that extra data source on our iPads showing other planes in the sky but of course… that stopped working halfway (or earlier?) through the flight. Sigh. Might be time to invest in our own WiFi device. As much as I say I want to solely be able to use my eyes, it’s frustrating when that cuts out and it’s a Saturday along a major city, under a Bravo airspace.
It was a cool flight (not temperature, ha ha, it was 86° when we took off and 91° when we landed in Waukegan)—we saw lots of people out on the beaches, lots of boats, and even saw the Goodyear blimp over the city! It looked really weird—like it was pointed down.
It was a bit windier on the way back though, and we were being thrown around a bit, so it felt good to land. And especially to open the doors and get a breeze going through the plane. That heat really takes it out of you!
Despite all my heat complaints, I had a really fun day. I hadn’t flown with Steven in 4 weeks because he’s been training to fly a bigger Cessna (182) than this one. I miss flying with him. I’ve really enjoyed learning about his training though. We even practiced the landing checklist he’d use on the larger Cessna in this one and I giggled each time we confirmed the gear was “down.” It’s always down in this plane. If it’s not it’s a big problem. That seemed really funny on the way back when the heat was getting to me.
