We made it. :-)

We made it to Missouri tonight. I landed the plane at a farm that belongs to friends here in southern Missouri. The runway is surrounded by tall corn -- so tall that when the plane is on the ground you can't see anything but corn!

The flight from Indiana to Chicago was a bit challenging because of low clouds and haze. It took about an hour and I was flying about 1000' above ground for most of the flight. When I got to Joliet, the winds were directly across the runway at 12 knots gusting to "19 to 24 knots". That's a direct crosswind that makes landings more challenging. A gusty crosswind is even more challenging because the wind can change quickly. Joliet has a grass runway that is aligned with the winds but I assumed that it was unusable because of the all of the rain.

As I came in for a landing, I hit strong wind shear just short of the runway, which had the effect of pushing me toward the ground. I added full power immediately to stop the descent and needed to make an immediate decision to continue with the landing or go around and try again. I decided to continue with the landing and made a safe landing on the centerline. I suspect that an observer would have been saying "What the heck is that guy doing?" Oh, well, they can't all be pretty.

The flight to southern Missouri was actually in two segments. We flew from Joliet to Quincy, IL and then stopped to get fuel. We then continued on down to the farm and landed just as night was falling.

It was great to arrive. As we got close, our friends asked me to turn the landing light when I was still about five miles out. As soon as I did, they said "We've got you -- you're right on course." My first approach to the farm was dead on to the runway but I didn't want to land straight in without having seen the runways first from the air. I came around but was too close to the farm to make it safely, so went around again and came in for a better approach. The landing was safe and uneventful and I got stopped long before the end of the grass strip.

Our friends had a great pot roast waiting for us, along with good wine and good companionship. It was a great end to an excellent day -- even if all those winds out of the south did have us making awfully slow headway over the ground. :-)