I made my annual trip up to Nova Scotia on September 1st. I departed around 9 AM Friday and flew up to St. Stephens to clear Canadian customs. When I called in from the airport, they just gave me a reporting number, and didn’t come out to look at the plane. I brewed up some tea and had lunch in the flying club shack there, and continued on after two hours. I flew up the coast of New Brunswick to Fundy Provincial Park, then hopped across from peninsula to peninsula to Stanley, which is between Truro and Windsor.

I was the only Yank there, which made me somewhat of a celebrity. I was real surprised when they called me up in front of the crowd during the Saturday night festivities to present me with the award for the longest distance flown to get there. A new Peltor headset came with the award.

It looked like rain was headed our way, so at 2 PM Sunday I headed home. It was a good smooth ride to Houlton. I spent too much time talking before I took off, and I was 15 minutes late, but that wasn’t a problem. I was held up for an hour while the customs agent looked for my pilot’s license number on the Internet, because I’d forgotten to bring it with me – bad move.

I was in and out of rain showers from Houlton on west at 2500′. The last thing I saw was Abbot Village just before I went solid IFR into cloud. When I didn’t pop out the other side, I turned around and headed SE toward lower terrain until I found a hole and spiraled down to 1500′. I continued SE until I recognized Parkman Village, so I followed Rt. 150 towards Skowhegan. After Harmony I broke out into good visibility with no more rain. By now it was after 6 PM, and my gas float had stopped bobbing, meaning 15 minutes until silence. I headed for Pittsfield, but realized that was cutting it too close, so I landed in Dale Hubbard’s hay field in Hartland. He happened to drive by just as I stumbled out to the road, so he grabbed a gas can and took me into West Athens for 5 gal of gas. It was now dark, but I could make out the borders of the field, so I took off again. There was no problem finding OWK, but the airport was closed for fireworks which I’d forgotten about completely, and people were driving out and parking along runway 03. As I approached the airport, Ken Morgan, our instructor, called on the radio and asked if that was me up there, then suggested that I land short on 15, so I did, stopping short of the intersection. Automobile traffic was halted temporarily while I taxied to my hanger. I stayed to watch the fireworks.

The next Wednesday I washed my plane. Dale Hubbard had just spread manure on his field the day before I landed there.