My wife and I had just gotten back from a camping trip to Nova Scotia in early September, when there was a call on my answering machine from fellow EAA Chapter member, Phil Tedrick, who wanted me to go out to the Midwest to inspect two amphibious airplanes he was considering buying, a Volmer Sportsman and an Anderson Kingfisher. He is a doctor and couldn’t get time off to go himself. So I headed out after barely a week of going through a week’s worth of mail and rushing to finish up a design project. He drove me down in Monday morning rush traffic, to Logan Airport, where I caught a Sun Country Airlines direct flight to Minneapolis. In Minneapolis I rented a car and drove 100 miles west where I met the Volmer owner at the small airport at Wilmar. I inspected the plane and the log books, then drove back to Minneapolis and flopped in a motel late that night. Next morning I was up at 5 am to turn in the car and catch a 7 am Sun Country flight to Milwaukee. The Kingfisher owner was waiting for me at the airport. He drove us to Kenosha where he keeps his Piper Twin Comanche. We hopped in that and flew down to Camdenton, Missouri. There we got in his other car and drove to his vacation house on Lake of the Ozarks where the Kingfisher was parked on a private boat ramp.

The Kingfisher was actually owned in partnership with former Snap-On Chairperson, Marion Gregory, and the boat ramp was just across a cove from his house. Marion’s house had about eight guest bedrooms in the basement level, and in the living room upstairs he used Snap-On tool chests for end tables. I had lunch there. You couldn’t meet a nicer guy, and it’s too bad that he was battling cancer. That was part of the reason for selling the Kingfisher. I’m glad that I was able to personally thank him for sponsoring the “Hints for Homebuilders” column in the EAA Sport Aviation magazine.

I inspected the Kingfisher, and the first owner and I made a flight off the lake. That night we went with neighbors on a speedboat ride up the lake to Red Fox’s Den and filled up on hot Ozark red neck food. By that night I was so turned around, I couldn’t remember what state I was in. I slept in a spare bedroom at the vacation house, and next morning we flew back to Kenosha. He let me fly most of the way while he dozed. He drove me back to Milwaukee, where I caught a US Airways flight back to Portland, with a layover in Philadelphia. Phil was waiting for me at Portland. He drove me back to his house outside Augusta where I picked up my truck and drove home, arriving just after midnight.

Both planes were well built and in good condition. Phil ended up buying the Kingfisher because it had a bigger engine allowing it to get off the water easier, and he was already building one just like it. Now he faced the dilemma of getting it back to Maine. He didn’t have much taildragger time and couldn’t get any substantial time off until November. I considered all the options, such as getting someone to ride out with me in my camper and then follow me back on the ground, or flying out in my plane with someone and flying both planes back in formation. He looked into having it disassembled and trucked back.

Finally we decided that I’d just go out and fly it back. On a Friday morning, I got on a United flight out of Portland for Milwaukee with a layover in Pittsburgh. Same routine: drive from Milwaukee to Kenosha, fly to Camdenton, drive to Lake of the Ozarks.

I preflighted the airplane and familiarized myself with the gauges and controls. It had what I characterize as a “John Denver fuel system”, in that it was totally counter intuitive. The valve for the right wing tank was centered under the panel, and the valve for the nose tank was over next to the right wing. It was also necessary to let go of the stick, and use both hands to manually retract the main wheels, one at a time. I rigged up my handheld radio and headset, and connected Phil’s GPS. The now previous owner dumped some gas in it. He was anxious for me to go, but I was exhausted and it was windy. I stayed overnight and took off the next morning, after an aural checkout by the previous owner. It was basically, “Do like this and that; goodbye and good luck”. I had never taken off from water before. I had to slalom around catfish traps on take off. I deployed the landing gear and made the short hop to the Camdenton airport to load up with gas. Upon landing I veered off the runway onto the grass, fortunately passing between the runway lights. The tail wheel was full swiveling, which made it necessary to get off the rudder pedals and onto the heel brakes immediately on touch down in order to maintain directional control. This was going to require a lot of concentration. I really didn’t want to prange this airplane, as that would kind of spoil the whole purpose of this trip. I endeavored henceforth to only land at airports with a wide runway, preferably grass, and orientated into the wind.

From Camdenton I headed for Lincoln, Illinois. A front cut me off before I got there, and I had to turn south and follow the Illinois River to St. Louis, where I landed at an outlying airport at St. Charles just after noon.

The weather didn’t improve until just after noon, two days later on Monday. I took off and followed the Mississippi around the northeast side of St. Louis, and picked up Interstate 70 heading east. I stopped for gas just to the west of Indianapolis, then immediately set out again around the north side of Indianapolis headed for Piqua, Ohio by dead reckoning. It was getting dark before I got there, so I put into Winchester, Indiana, and stayed in a motel for the night. The next morning I headed direct for Alliance, Ohio using the GPS. I landed there around noon, gassed up, ate some fig newtons and headed east again.

After getting well into Pennsylvania by following interstate 80, I made a pylon turn around a 1900 foot smokestack to take up a direct course for Tunkhannock, PA, just north of Wilkes-Barre. At just that moment, as I was looking down into a wooded ravine, the engine quit. Arms and legs flew in all directions, as I kicked the plane level with the rudder, shut off the empty wing tank and opened the nose tank. The engine caught. I resumed breathing.

After traversing the wilderness north of Lock Haven, I let down deep into the Susquehanna Valley to land at Tunkhannock. There I slept on a couch in the manager’s office. I had Phil’s cell phone, so he could make nightly calls for a progress report; however, down in this hollow I was incommunicado. Phil, being concerned that I might be hanging in a tree somewhere, eventually tracked down the number in the manager’s office, and called me there around two in the morning. I stumbled around bare assed in the pitch black office feeling for the phone, and reported in to a very relieved airplane owner.

The next morning I had plenty of time to put gas and oil in the plane, as the fog didn’t burn off until 9 am. I flew directly over Kingston, NY enroute to Great Barrington, MA for a gas stop. From there I flew to Augusta, ME in one hop. I landed on the grass next to runway 26 in a windstorm at 2:30 Wednesday afternoon on October 6th.

The exhaust from the Kingfisher’s pylon-mounted engine exits right above the plexiglass skylite. The long snout makes it rather directionally unstable, so it was necessary constantly correct the direction with the stick. The fat Piper Cub wings only allowed an airspeed of 80 to 85 mph. I was exhausted from the noise and work of flying the plane, and I hadn’t eaten properly for days. Phil, bless him, took me to a spaghetti joint, where he nibbled and I gorged. I walked out with my cheeks puffed out like a chipmunk with a winter’s supply of seeds.