Japan to Singapore

After that giant flight from Adak, I crashed on the 7th of August and spent the day mostly just sleeping. That leg had occupied my mind for months, and having it behind me was like passing that final exam or handing in that thesis you’ve been working on for years. The result is that I didn’t see much of Sapporo – or more specifically, the surroundings in Hokkaido, which by all accounts are beautiful. I found a really nice coffee shop next to my hotel and spent much of the day there. I ended up frequenting Komeda Coffee throughout my stay in Japan and binging on their Kuro Neige – chocolate cake and ice cream. I do worry that this is like a Japanese person coming to South Africa or the USA for the first time and listing the Spur or IHOP as their best first impressions. But it’s also the little things that tell you more about a culture: at every restaurant in Japan you get a little hand towel with your drink or your meal, and this ended up being just one of the many subtle touches that really impressed me about Japan. Some others being the excellent, friendly, polite service wherever you go, and the no-tipping culture. Friendliness and service are included. New York, take note.

8 August 2024: Sapporo to Yao

So on arriving in Japan I had to land at New Chitose International (RJCC) specifically to clear customs and immigration. But there’s no AvGas there, so this required a quick reposition from RJCC to Sapporo (RJCO) for fuel before I could fly onwards. Peter Steeger’s arrangements throughout Japan were absolutely flawless and he made the whole experience exceptionally smooth and enjoyable, even though I know there’s a ton of paperwork and bureaucracy that he dealt with on my behalf behind the scenes. I wanted to stop in Kyoto and Peter suggested flying to Yao just outside Osaka. This is one of the busiest general aviation airports in Japan where they would be more used to dealing with smaller aircraft like mine. After an uneventful flight all down the west coast of Honshu island I crossed the fairly substantial mountains in the south for landing at Yao. I was met by Masahiro, one of Peter’s friends from the Japanese Bonanza Society, who helped me with fueling and navigating through the airport and arranged a taxi to Kyoto.

Kyoto ended up being my favorite stopover so far. Thoroughly enjoyed the culture and amazing food and service in Kyoto. For hotels I tend to favor well-known western chains generally because I already have memberships at most of them due to my business travel, but also I know what to expect from them and getting good rest and food is critical to safe flying. So in Kyoto it was the Hilton and it was a great, modern hotel. And boy, the toilets in Japan are as complicated as a 1980’s hifi system. Pressing the wrong button is going to end up with a wet suprise in a spot you didn’t expect.

Of course the food is fantastic. There are all these little hole-in-the-wall restuarants with the best Japanese fare that you can imagine.

It’s also completely natural to see people dressed in traditional wear. I was inspired and got my own tailored haori as one of the few mementos I’ve bought on this trip. I’ve been traveling with a flight suit, two pilot shirts and two pairs of jeans thus far!

With Kyoto done, I had another of many future over-ocean flights to get to Naha, Okinawa.

11 August 2024: Yao to Okinawa

Flying in Japan is fairly straight forward. You’re able to file your flight plans via ForeFlight (our standard aviation app in the US). Air Traffic control is polite and speaks good English and there aren’t many surprises. I file an instrument flight plan for every flight regardless of conditions since this assures you’re flying “in the system” and in Japan you have to file regardless. Most of the subtleties between countries are in how they approach the more informal VFR (visual flight rules) so by choice I just avoid it if it’s even an option.

Yao to Okinawa was again a fairly substantial over-water flight. I’d shifted to wearing just a flight suit (orange for visibility) in stead of the heavy and cumberson immersion suit. Water were now basically tropical temperature so in the case of a ditching immediate hypothermia, as you would encounter in the Aleutians, is no longer such a big risk. There’s much better rescue coverage in Japanese waters.

Naha, Okinawa is one of several major international airports on my trip where I slot in right between the airlines. Substantial cumulunumbis clouds (CBs for short), show up all over the landmasses in these part of the world towards the afternoon. I did my best trying to avoid them, resisting ATCs directions to fly through them, but eventually gave in and went straight through one. To my regret. The kind of shake this can give you is substantial – all the loose stuff in the plane basically hit the roof. Lesson learned at that point was to be a hard-arse with ATC when they try and do things that are patently unsafe to small aircraft. It was to prove necessary multiple times later on.

13 August 2024: Okinawa to Clark, Philippines

Okinawa was fairly brutal in terms of heat and humidity and I needed a good rest day, so I spent most of the rest day doing admin in my hotel room. The stretch to Clark was going to be all over water again with the added complication of convective weather. (This was going to be a feature throughout South East Asia and India).

Unfortunately my HF system still isn’t perfect. It seems on frequencies below around 14Mhz it’s transmit performance really suffers. That should be largely the effect of the fairly short 14ft antenna – although I suspect there’s more to it. I’ve spent the price of a small car on getting this right so it’s deeply annoying. That meant Tokyo Radio couldn’t hear me as I left the range of VHF over the Phillipine Sea but I managed a few relays via airliners and eventually made contact with Manilla via Flight Service on Batan Island (who was very friendly). Tokyo Radio did start to feel like a worried parent at times! I had to dodge some substantial banks of CBs again just before reaching Luzon, but they were fairly easily avoidable.

On flying the approach into Clark I could just about make out Mount Pinatubo in the distance. This volcano erupted spectacularly in 1991 – considered one of the largest volcanic eruptions in the past century.

It was interesting to consider just how many US military bases I’d stopped by or flown over thus far. Cold Bay, Adak, Shemya, Okinawa (Kadena) and Clark are all sites of substantial past and current US military presence. I guess we have our past US tax dollars to thank for the infrastructure. Not that that helped reduce the bill.

My stopover at Clark ended by far being the most expensive of the trip so far – $6600. At least the two guys working for the handling company were really friendly and hard-working. Clark was also where fuel supply continued to be full drums of AvGas that had to be pre-ordered and paid for in full drum increments.

Unfortunately this is also the one airport where it was a real problem getting my flight plan accepted. I never fully understood what the issue was, but apparently I either had to be VFR or at flight level 180 or above. Neither which I wanted to do. Additionally the airport was going to close for runway maintenance – and Seletar at some point would close to inbound traffic too. With the clock winding down I gave myself till 8am local time, and then I simply cancelled. This meant the plane went back in the hangar, I had to cancel my Philippines exit stamp, book another night in the hotel, forfeit my prepaid hotel in Singapore etc. But as pilots at some point when all the little things add up it just ends up becoming too much to ensure a continued safe flight.

16 August 2024: Philippines to Singapore

The next day everything went much better. Flight plan was in the system and approved and left on time. Most of the flight was super smooth. It was really novel to be flying over the South China Sea. Large parts of it is contested with China claiming possession of parts of the Spratly Islands (a claim rejected by the United Nations in 2016). So at some point in the flight I heard the Chinese Navy come on 121.5 (called the “guard” frequency since all aircraft monitor this). This was something I’ve only ever heard on news reports and videos of encounters between US Airforce aircraft and the Chinese. “This is the Chinese Navy. Aircraft, please alter your course to prevent a mistake”. (yes, including the odd English). I’m still not sure whether this was directed at me – the signal was certainly strong enough. Either way, I was in international airspace and wasn’t inclined to engage them. Two other times it was the Philippine Airforce chasing aircraft away, but they were much more specific in stating altitude, heading and squawk code of the offending aircraft.

I passed by Layang Layang which is a Malaysian dive resort also in this area. (My Singaporian scuba-diving friend Ye-Her says it’s a bit run down these days). Certainly looked nice with its own runway.

So everything was going simmingly until I had about two hours to go. I obviously checked the weather before leaving and nothing significant was forecast for my route of flight. Singapore had some convective weather forecast, but this happens basically every day into the late afternoon.

The problem is that a lot can change during ten hours of flying and this is exactly what happened. As I was approaching the Indonesian Riau islands I saw this bank of weather appearing ahead of me and my strikefinder starting showing significant “blips”. (The strikefinder is a basic weather device that detects lightning strikes – those being a good proxy for dangerous convective weather and thunderstorms). What I didn’t know was the extent of it – much larger than I anticipated. And of course it wasn’t meant to be there according the the morning’s forecast. I could hear all the airliners ahead of me asking ATC to divert around weather, but it was hard to determine just where exactly that was. My small aircraft doesn’t carry any kind of radar system and the airliners fly at more than twice my altitude. I started weaving my way through it the best I could, but at some point it rained so hard I lost paint off of the aircraft (as I discovered afterwards). To make a long story short – this was by far the dodgiest part of my trip. (And it’s already two weeks later as I finally write this down). I made it through, but it was a 90 minute battle I don’t plan on repeating.

Eventually I had Singapore in sight and was vectored around a bit before having a fairly uneventful landing at Seletar, Singapore’s civilian airport. I was mightly happy to be on the ground though. The lesson learned was to continue having ground support which whom I could communicate during long flights, and my friends Jon and Pierre (both highly experienced airline pilots with significant military and charter backgrounds) would be called on multiple times to provide same in subsequent flights.

Singapore was also my midway stop on my trip. Seletar has excellent facilities and I was scheduled to have an oil change done at Wings Over Asia (who also acted as my handlers). Great facility. Additionally, I have lots of friends in Singapore who all were classmates of mine at MIT and it was great to see them all. I won’t “out” them here, but they’re all very successful – and some in very very senior government and military positions.

With my aircraft serviced and with me properly rested and fed, I was ready for the second half of the RTW flight. Bankok was next.