The Breakfast Club

An Affiliate of the Arizona Pilots Assn

 

 

The Knife & Fork

 

 

 

Breakfast Club Heads To The Boarder, Angie's Cafe





12 March 2005
by Warren McIlvoy

It was sure nice to finally get some truly great flying weather for the March Breakfast Club event to Nogales, Arizona and Angie"s Café. As you might recall, the last 3-weeks of February were rain soaked and as such, the weather washed-out, on two occasions, our scheduled event to Kingman. So with clear skies being the order of the day, we departed Scottsdale Airport and turned south and, with clearance, we traversed the Phoenix Class B airspace and turned to the southeast.

After being released by Phoenix Tracon, I tuned-in on our air-to-air, group flight following frequency to report-in. Don Downin (BC-10) responded but he was with another group that was going to Tucson, Ryan for their annual "Aviation Day" celebration. His beautifully restored and polished aluminum, Piper 140, The Silver Eagle, draws attention to any show or airport that he visits and I am quite sure that he would get his share of attention at Ryan. There was a lot of frequency chatter by several groups going to different places so we were not able to talk much until we go south of Ryan and the "air chatter" thinned-out.

Even if the radio airways were clouded with congestion, the skies were clear as a bell. After passing Ryan, I could clearly see Kitt Peak Observatory off to our starboard side. Mount Wrightson at 9500' was plainly visible to our port side as we traveled further south. The ASOS at Nogales International Airport (that's right "international") stated that the winds were light and favoring left traffic for runway 21. I reported 5 miles to the north for a mid field cross-over for the pattern. After securing my airplane, my wife and I joined-up with some of the early arrivals and to get some photos of other arriving aircraft. Alan & Mary Travis were one of the last to arrive in the NEW Diamond DA40-180, but more on them latter.

We all rejoined in the terminal building and Angie's Café. Angie's is a small café to the right as you enter the terminal. Tiffen Aviation Services is to the left. Larry Tiffen is also the airport manager as well as the owner of the FBO and his wife operates the small café. Seating is somewhat limited as there are only about 5-6 tables available. The café is a semi, self service style. The menu is on the wall adjacent to the walk-up order window. The coffee (aka rocket fuel), is to the right of the window. As you might guess, the menu is somewhat limited as you might expect from a small, sorta outback type operation, but the prices were quite inexpensive. My wife and I got the last of the tables along with Brant & Linda Saperstein. After placing our orders and getting our drinks, I started filling -out the attendance sheet and passing it around. I also got some photos of the folks at various tables as we waited for our food orders to arrive. And we waited..............and waited................and waited..............and waited. I would guess that it was 45-minutes before we got our orders. The food was OK but they are definitely not geared to serve a large influx of hungry aviators (that can not be good) even after I gave them a weeks notice that we would be arriving. By the time that we got our food, some of the folks were ready to leave.

After topping-off with fuel (the airplane as opposed to rocket) that was about .40 a gallon cheaper than at Scottsdale, some of us walked down to where Alan had his new plane parked. That DA40 sure had ramp appeal. The "all glass" panel looked like something right out of a corporate jet. It took Alan a good 15-minutes to clean-off al the drool from the envious onlookers. The wind had picked-up just a tad that reinforced the decision to depart runway 21. The trip home retraced our inbound flight but with a slight headwind, it took about 10-minutes more for the return leg.

 

The Nogales Squad

  • Warren & Jeri-Ann McIlvoy in 4544X, BC-1& 1.5
  • Glen & Judy Yoder and Rick & Becky Hamburg in 31TC, BC-007
  • Larry Jensen in 14LJ, BC-65
  • Curt & Cindy Browning in 8287D, BC-008
  • Brant & Linda Saperstein and Rick Mays in 8402B
  • Steve & Cindy Brown with Mallory Brown and Brittany Manka in 2246R
  • Richard Azimov and Jordan Ross in 6864Q, BC-2 and 11
  • Alan & Mary Travis in 415DS

 

What's Next?

The April Breakfast Club event will see us traveling to a new location, Williams, Arizona. We will be dinning at Max & Thelmas that is next door to the Grand Canyon Railroad Station. In May, we will be returning to the Echo Bay Marina that is on a finger of Lake Mead. That's all for now but remember, fly safe.

Click on the Nogales link to view photos of this fly-in event.