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A Preface
For those of you who have not yet heard of the Great South American Air Adventure, I provide this brief preface. At the end you will have the opportunity to view a day by day summary of the trip, and eventually detailed information derived from my journal. The Great South American Air Adventure was a totally non-profit activity done purely for the love of adventure by two men who can't afford their own dreams.
The actual journey took place in late 1995 and early 1996. The adventure began two years earlier in a small pub in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. A good friend and a fellow pilot, Paul Hamer, I, and a few other assorted friends and aviation enthusiasts were sharing fellowship and attempting to consume at least one shot of each type of liquor visible on the shelf behind the bar. As I recall, Paul and I were seated on the bar (not at the bar, on the bar) with our feet firmly planted on the stools in and effort to delay the eminent and inevitable tumble to the floor. The beverage of the moment was tequila, in a shot glass, lit on fire prior to ingestion. This was one of those moments of indiscretion that one hesitates to admit, but non the less refuses to regret. Sometime following the shots but prior to falling off the bar, Paul's tongue was adequately loosened by the spirits to cause him to admit that he had an urge to fly to South America. Upon further discussion, we decided that the trip should be made in open cockpit biplanes, so that no scenic detail could be missed (and there, from thence forth, could never ever be any question of the pilots manhood). A brief geography lesson ensued, and the war cry of the rest of the evening became "Tierra del Fuego!" which was repeated countless times at the top of our lungs. More flaming shots of tequila followed, of course, because "Tierra del Fuego" translated from the Spanish means Land of Fire. The rest of that night and most of the following morning is a bit of a blur, but God bless the bartender of the TNT bar and his wife for taking us safely to their home and allowing us all to sleep in their living room.
In reality, I suppose my fate had already been sealed by the next morning when I woke with the cry Tierra del Fuego! still ringing in my ears. In my mind, however, I did not completely acquiesce to destiny until a few weeks later when I was discussing with my mother the possibility that Paul and I may fly to South America in biplanes. Mom was in favor of the idea (my adventurous side must come from her) and we decided to look at the atlas. The book that we consulted was the same atlas that had been in my parents house since I was a child. When we found the map of South America there was an old pencil mark, a check mark, on the page right next to Tierra del Fuego. That was it. That was my sign. As you fellow sign readers out there know, I had no choice from that moment forth.
So, for the next year and a half, all spare time was dedicated to The Great South American Air Adventure. The first few months were spent arranging sponsors and locating two biplanes in which to make the trip, and about a year was spent modifying the biplanes for the trip. I can't even begin to guess how many man-hours this phase of the project consumed. Paul and I both took hangars at the Tekamah, NE airport, and literally spent more time there than we did at home. Our kids all spent hours playing in the hangars and fields around the small, rural airport. I have many happy memories of that time of my life. Working on the airplane, y son working on the go-cart, my daughter making sculptures from the scraps of aluminum that I generated.
About 100 days before our scheduled departure, something happened to change the mood. Paul and I were both making test flights in our biplanes at the airport. Both planes were nearly ready to go. After 45 minutes of flight I decided to land. My first landing didn't feel right, so I circled around the traffic pattern and approached the runway a second time. When I was on the base leg of the standard traffic pattern, about 500 feet off the ground, my engine stopped, and I saw that my propeller was no longer turning. My memory of what happened during the 15 seconds that followed are very clear. About 5 seconds were wasted on denial. Another 5 seconds were spent trying to restart the engine, while simultaneously pointing the little airplane perpendicular to the road at the north end of the runway so that, if the engine didn't start, I would have a chance of making it across the road without hitting the deep drainage ditches on either side of it. When the engine didn't start, I clearly recall saying out loud "well, it looks like we're going to land now." I'm not sure why I said "we," as I was the only person in the plane, I guess it just made me feel better. Surprisingly, there was no time for fear until after the crash. I set the plane up to land in the bean field north of the runway. The landing felt fine, and I was anticipating at worst a little landing gear damage. My airspeed indicator had failed at some point during or before the flight, so I was pretty much landing by the "seat of my pants." None the less, the landing felt good. As you biplane pilots out there know, you have very little forward visibility when landing a biplane due to the tail wheel configuration and the fact that lower wing blocks your view. Because of that little detail, I never saw the barbed wire fence across the bean field until after I got out of the airplane (which was upside down at the time of my egress). We didn't find my goggles until after they harvested the beans.
As I said, it was then just 100 days prior to our scheduled departure date. We only had one biplane left and it wasn't big enough to carry two people to South America. We had about 25 sponsors and we didn't want to let them down. Most of all, we still wanted to go to South America. We decided to find an airplane that we could do the trip in together. Paul sold his sports car to cover the additional expense. We located a 1952 Piper TriPacer with a 125 horsepower engine, through an ad on the internet. The airplane was located in Phoenix, Arizona. We flew out on one way tickets, and returned in the antique rag-wing airplane that was technically not airworthy (as we later discovered). There was much work to be done and little time to do it. I was still depressed because of the heap of scrap that was in my hangar, and the lost year that went into it (I have since realized that the year was not really lost, and I now remember it fondly). We (mostly Paul) stripped the TriPacer and, with the help of our sponsors, made it into an airplane that could fly to South America and return.
What follows is a daily summary
of the Great South American Air Adventure. It is comprised primarily of
eight "updates" that were faxed back to the USA during the course of the
journey. The updates were edited in the USA by friend Glenn Miller, and
transmitted by mail, email, and fax to friends, family, and sponsors all
over the country. I plan to revise this page occasionally, and add pictures
when I have the time. As you read these pages, keep in mind that neither Paul
nor I were instrument rated pilots, nor was Hobson's Choice (our
little airplane) equipped for instrument flight.
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of the links work, and some are still under construction.
CLICK TO VIEW THE TEXT OF THE ORIGINAL GSAAA UPDATES:
PHOTOS OF THE GREAT SOUTH AMERICAN AIR ADVENTURE:
THE (FIRST) CRASH
PLAN 'B' - FINDING AND PREPPING HOBSON'S CHOICE
DEPARTING THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
MEXICO
GUATEMALA
EL SALVADOR
NICARAGUA
COSTA RICA
PANAMA
COLUMBIA
ECUADOR
PERU
CHILE
ARGENTINA
THE RETURN
RETRIEVING HOBSON'S CHOICE
MORE ABOUT GSAAA:
THE NEWSLETTERS THAT WE SENT TO SPONSORS AND
SUPPORTERS PRIOR TO DEPARTURE:
OUR BELOVED SPONSORS: