Berlin,NH-New Bremen,NY: Continuing my journey around the perimeter of the contiguous U.S., I planned to see Niagara Falls. Departing KBML, I turned the PA-32 west, heading 274. I had to climb rapidly to clear the 3000 ft. mountains, but soon settled in at 4500 ft. Across New Hampshire and Vermont, the woods and hills rolled by in monotony, with occasional higher ridges. I saw a Cessna Skylane, and later, a Beech Baron in the distance. Crossing into New York, Lake Champlain was a huge swath of blue before the Adirondacks rose up again.

I had noticed the cloud bottoms were below my altitude, and then what appeared to be a cloud going all the way to the ground. Rain! I passed a rainstorm on my left, then a closer one to my right, then a whole line of storms on both sides. I don’t think I entered the clouds, but they were close enough to create quite a bit of turbulence. (The log entry showed .1 hours instrument. Ironically, it was raining outside my window in the real world, too.)

The plentiful airports near the lake had disappeared behind me, with over an hour left to go, and my butt was getting tired, so I decided to land at the next airport. Duflo (NY10), was on my route, so I pushed on. I saw what looked like an airport beacon where it should be, so I started down. The white pixel turned out to be a factory, with no airport in sight. I flew around, searching, until I saw the private field (asphalt and grass runways, no beacon) below me. In a real plane, I would have flown a pattern, but I just tried to force it down. I bounced, then crashed. I’m sure the insurance company will have it ready for the next flight.

New Bremen-Niagara Falls: Since I knew the route from the interrupted last flight, I did not make a flight plan. I spawned on the asphalt runway at Duflo, took off and turned to 274 degrees. The land was much flatter, and it looked like more fields and less forest. After a while, I was approaching Lake Ontario. From the map, it seemed I would be over the lake for most of the trip, so I turned toward shore and paralleled just to be safe. I spotted a cooling tower for a nuclear power plant. Approaching Rochester, I made landfall and noticed the land appeared more suburban/urban. There was even a skyline. I saw a de Havilland Dash 80 that had just taken off. From the map, I saw that I had to turn west toward Buffalo. There, I spotted a Boeing 737.

I continued toward KIAG (Niagara Falls Intl.), but decided to sightsee before landing. I flew toward the river and the restricted area, slowly getting down to about 1000 feet. The falls were more dynamic than I had hoped, especially the Canadian side. The attention to detail was impressive. I turned back to KIAG, and managed to drag it in to Runway 10L, although I almost hit a house and a tree.

I turned off left onto the taxiway and saw a fancy building with a domed roof. Swear to God, next to it was a GIANT CHICKEN on a pole! I taxied to a hangar and parked next to what looked like a Cessna Caravan.