Santa Catalina Island is about 25 miles off the coast of Southern California. A popular tourist destination, it also has an interesting General Aviation airport stretched on top off a plateau.

I’m a Private Pilot, but I still get giddy when I have a chance to go flying. Yesterday was no exception.

After visiting some friends in Hermosa Beach, I dropped by Torrance, California’s airport, Zamperini Field. This is a normal activity for me – to check out the local airfield.

I admired a new Piper Matrix that taxied up to transient parking – a truly beautiful airplane. The Matrix pilot walked over to where I was standing and asked if there was an ATM. I told him there wasn’t but I could drive him to one a few blocks away. He accepted, and we chatted about flying, naturally. Turns out this Matrix pilot is a Piper dealer and he was getting ready to take the Editor of PilotMag up for a demo flight. They were going to Catalina Island for lunch. When he asked me to join them I just about fainted!

Being an Eagle Scout I like to think I roll somewhat prepared, so I keep my pilot headset in the trunk of my car… just in case. You never know when you’ll have to jump in an airplane and fly. It’s considered a pilot’s best practice to us one’s own headset. When they’re not flying, pilots tote their headsets in protective cases. By the way, every time I use my David Clark headset I’m reminded of how generous my old roommate was. He gave the headset to me as a Christmas gift when we were flying together during the mid 90s.

You can click on the following thumbnails and view a slightly larger version of each:

If you are keeping up with General Aviation you’ll know that there have been some exciting advances, not only with airplanes, but with the avionics that pilots use to navigate. The 6 leather-seated, air-conditioned Piper Matrix that we were flying was fully loaded, including the Garmin G1000. It was an all “glass cockpit” with all of the bells and whistles over which any pilot would drool.

We pulled out of Zamperini Field’s pattern, climbed to 7,500 feet and zipped over to Catalina. The water below was so beautiful. The island was crawling with buffalo… and people.

Catalina’s “Airport in the Sky” is perched on top of a small mountain. It can be a tricky landing, but the editor of Pilot Magazine was in the left seat (pilot in command) and made a sweet landing. He said the airplane was a pleasure to fly.

The flight back to Torrance was quick. We sped back at 4,500, then used the air brakes to slow down as we approached Zamperini Field runway 29. As we taxied back to transient parking I looked out the window and saw about 6 pilots standing on the ramp admiring the plane.

What a fun trip. Thanks, Piper. Thanks to Mike Borden from High Performance Aircraft. And thanks to Jeff Berlin, the editor at PilotMag. I’m holding my breath, but a couple of my pictures may be used for the magazine’s write-up.

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Also… Check it out on my Flickr photostream.