After a quick bite in a "cafe" (Okay, it was an Ihop.
) I hurried back to the airport and was back in the air in an hour.
During lunch the weather had closed in. The wind picked up and storm clouds were brewing. The weather report called for rain, but I thought I could bet it.
I didn't. Ten minutes out of Montpellier and it started to rain.
It wasn't bad so I puddered on.
This wasn't the nice Mediterrainean weather I had heard of, rainy and 10C? No.
The rain didn't let up until I reached Spain. Right before the mountian range that seperates the two countries, the sky opened up. The rain stopped and the clouds pulled back, leaving me with a breath-taking view of a mountianous landscape.
I pulled Peggy up to 5,000 feet to clear the southern end and entered Spain.
I continued east along the coast pretty much unevenfully.
I watched my fuel gauge as my gas disappeared. At a small airport named Almeria my fuel was down to 35%. It was still about two hours until nightfall, and I was 200 miles from from my goal of Gibraltar. I had to choose between safty, landing then and refueling at Almeria, or continueing on to another airport some 70 miles away.
I kept going...
On my right mountians rose up to me, and on my left was the Mediterrainean. So if I ran out of juice, I didn't have much of a choice of landing strips.
Ten miles out I called the Malaga tower and got permission to land. I had been foolishly worrying about fuel levels when I had more than enough. I swung out over the sea for a long final with 20% of my fuel left.
Maybe it was the nearly empty fuel tanks, or my tiredness, but Peggy hit the ground hard, tires screaming and smoking.
I taxied her to the pumps for a fresh drink and to "relieve" myself.
I still had a few miles to fly...
I'll going to get the next leg up quick....
Here's the last few legs if you missed them:
Leg IV:
http://www.simviation.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=screen;action=display;num=...Leg III:
http://www.simviation.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=screen;action=display;num=...Leg II:
http://www.simviation.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=screen;action=display;num=...Leg I:
http://www.simviation.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=screen;action=display;num=...Thanks for watching!
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