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You, good Sir, are a poet! Eloquent and sublime writing. Bravo!
Such descriptive genius here. You can feel how regal that morning was and your heightened sense of relief was ever apparent.
Well, S***. 
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CHAPTER 7
CATHARSIS
Tokyo-Haneda International Airport (RJTT), Tokyo, Japan TO Gwangju Airport (RKJJ), Sinchon-dong, Gwangsan-gu, South Korea
2 November 2023, Dawn.
635NM. ETE: However long it takes.
Crossing the Pacific had been a great challenge, and at times, a challenge it truly was! But at this point, I felt the need to leave the tyranny of the Navigator’s station behind and get back to the simple joys of flying.
Besides, there was no way that I could fly the Latécoère to the elevation of ZUDC, nor could I land there even if I could (well, more than once).
So, with great solemnity, I bid farewell to my faithful companion.
She was a good friend.
In pursuit of slipping the surly bonds for a while, I chose what I hoped would be a straightforward path, which comprised really only three victory conditions:
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Find the Sea of Japan.
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Find South Korea.
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Land.
Beyond that, everything else was gravy.
I was looking for something fast, but vintage. Enter the Milviz Corsair in the colors of VMF-214. My fuel planning was limited to triple bagging her, which felt like enough to get me to Korea.
Without much further ado, I climbed into my mount, set the throttle to the wire, and roared off into the morning twilight to meet whatever fate had in store for me.
Speed? Moar!
Direction? Thataway!
Well, mostly. There was about zero chance that I was going to fly all the way to Tokyo and not see Mt. Fuji. I am, after all, an unrepentant cyber tourist (you hear that, Google? TOUR-IST. Don’t go reporting me!) So, I put the thing on the thing and headed off in that direction.
As the Sun broke the horizon, and I broke the final ridgelines between myself and Fuji, I was awestruck by its beauty and majesty as she spread her massive shoulders over the surrounding plain.
Reaching her base, I zoomed to the summit to more fully appreciate the sheer immensity of her. Incredible!
After an orbit or two, I was reminded that I had places to be; airspace to violate. So, I flipped the Corsair on its back and dove down Fuji’s western slopes.
Steep!
And, like that, I was back in the weeds. What a glorious day to fly!
Mata ne, Fujiyama! See you again!
I was now almost assuredly nowhere near my original courseline, but I was OK with that. I was having fun, the weather was spectacular, and I’d know when I reached the Sea of Japan when my shoes got wet!
In actuality of course, I wasn’t quite as flippant as all that. Broadly speaking, I was keeping myself hemmed in between Lake Biwa to the south and the Tsuruga Peninsula to the north. I figured that, once I got to the coast, I could look around and find something recognizable on the chart.
Anyway, that was the plan, until I spotted what I guessed was Lake Biwa on my left.
Except. Except I’m pretty sure that Lake Biwa wasn’t this large.
So, that would be the Sea of Japan then 
and I was a little north of where I thought I should be. That made sense, I guessed, as Mt Fuji had taken me south and I had spent most of the time since leaning north in compensation.
Well, I’d always been told that I was overcompensating for something. It was nice to know what that was finally!
That meant that it was time for me to turn. A quick honk on over to the west and I picked up the Tsuruga Peninsula with Cape Tateishi at its end.
From there I continued west along the northern coast until I spotted Lake Shinii, my coast out point for South Korea. That’s it straight ahead.
One more course correction over the west end of the lake and I bid Japan farewell!
Once over the sea, I turned my attention to the horizon and resumed my familiar alchemy, of trying to turn water into land.
Eventually, I succeeded.
I came ashore this time either left of course at Gimnhae or right, at Ulsan. A little chart association revealed it to be the latter.
As I pressed inland, I began to notice a fine cloud or haze layer forming over the mountains. I was once again somewhat ill-equipped for a penetration in this aircraft and I assumed that a PAR or ASR were completely out of the question, at least in this decade. So, I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.
I continued to drive west, checking off landmarks as I found them. In due course, I spotted the sprawling basin that encompassed Gwangju. The field was easy enough to find and I attempted my best Pappy Boyington roll in to the break.
I hauled on a good hard break to downwind, and even managed to get below gear speed before touchdown! 
A little long in the groove, but I won’t tell if you don’t.
And a decent enough landing…at least until I touched down.
I had forgotten to lock the tailwheel! 
And so, there it is. A little meandering, but I managed to not touch a single navigational instrument for the entire thing, which was…deeply Zen.
So, I hadn’t so much intended this to become a thing. But it’s totally a thing now. I don’t keep much in the way of Soju around, so I had to remain one leg in arrears with a cold delicious Sapporo.
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Hehe. Well, that’s very nice of you to say. It’s fun to throw a hint of the dramatic in there every now and again.
Maybe if this flying thing falls through, I can write greeting cards!
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I noticed that you dropped two of the external fuel tanks at some point.
Wheels
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They were such a drag!
Actually, I think the last time I tried to switch fuel tanks I passed through OFF.
And, apparently, you don’t just pass through OFF in the Corsair!
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Haha! I think it was one of my flights in DCS MiG-19 when instead of closing the canopy I actually jettisoned it.
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Excellent AAR as always. I think you hit on the reason entertainment flight simulation exists, and probably why we are all here, and that is the joy of flight. Glad it was a good trip!
Or books. That seems to be the popular choice for pilots nowadays.
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I would buy one
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It was a bit early when I first read that to join you in a toast. I don’t have any Sapporo to hand, but I do have a half decent Whisky.
Kanpai
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CHAPTER 8
ENNUI
Gwangju Airport (RKJJ), Sinchon-dong, Gwangsan-gu, South Korea TO Yancheng Nanyang International Airport (ZSYN), Nanyang, Jiangsu Province, China
3 November 2023, 0700L (2 November 2023 2200Z)
344NM. ETE: 2+07
Coming off the back of my reckless tear across Japan, old, vague feelings began to descend upon me.
Luckily, I was able to correctly interpret those feelings…
Loss of Essence…
Uh, wait, not that.
Often, I find that life (and simulation) have the poor taste of failing to follow the rules of drama. At this stage, the most difficult obstacles of the trip were behind me. Though they were challenging, sometimes even frustrating, I was already beginning to miss those heart racing days at sea, scribbling sums furiously while the chronometer counted down towards my next sextant shot and hoping that I wasn’t on the road to nowhere.
Now, as I approached my final destination, I found myself simultaneously attracted to and repelled from it. I needed to get there but, when I did, the journey would be over.
So I chose to savor, as time permitted, my last few legs to ZUDC. This first one would have me set foot on mainland China for the first time.
At 344NM, straight across the Yellow Sea, it looked to be fairly straightforward.
Dawn again on a peaceful Korean autumn morning. My ride for today, the DC-3 with Duckworks mod and MAG-25 livery by Jamespejam. I love the old, worn look of these MAG-25 liveries. It gives the aircraft the mien of an old warhorse, proud but persnickety. Tired, but with a lot of fight left in him…when he felt like it!
With that unbearable lightness of being that the DC-3 always seems to possess, the aircraft raised up on its forefeet and lifted off into the calm fall dawn.
As I climbed to my cruising altitude, a marine layer that seemed so appropriate for the region rolled languidly beneath me. I picked up my outbound radial from Gwangju.
VOR? Bah, newfangled gadget. It’ll never catch on!
As I had prepared with my usual thoroughness for this flight, I was more or less guessing as to the prop and power settings. So, it was with little surprise that I began to hear a disquieting roaring sound as I levelled off and pulled back my throttles to cruise.
Frantically, I scanned the engines, certain that I had exceeded some limit and somehow set one of the engines ablaze!
I had also just reached my feet wet point. If I needed to duck for safety, it would have to be soon.
So, fun fact.
You can open the side windows of the DC-3 by clicking on the Plexiglas handle mounted onto the front of the window.
However, if your mouse happens to hover over it, the handle will disappear. This is true when the window is closed.
And when it is open.
Which might explain why I didn’t catch that my window had at some point been opened by an errant click. That would certainly account for the, you know, loud roaring noise.
I’m certainly going through my fair share of seat cushions this year!
Anyway, that crisis averted, I returned to such mundane tasks as, oh I don’t know, finding China?
That proved to be somewhat more difficult than I had expected. My thought had been to pick up the Yangcheng VOR well before the IKADI intersection, thereby leading me along airway W-113 to ZSYN. But, as I often forget, the day of the VOR is behind us. With a segment length of 169NM to the YCH VOR, it would be unusual at least to have picked up the signal this far out. This segment seems like it was designed with GPS/IRS in mind.
However, getting a sense that my path must have crossed IKADI by now, I began cheating a little bit towards the inbound course. If I was a little early, then I might come out a bit north. But, if I didn’t turn until I got a signal, I could wind up well south, if I got a signal at all.
Fudging seemed the safer course.
Eventually, and with perhaps less angst than usual, I spotted the Chinese coast. Since the VOR still hadn’t come in at this point, the question was, where?
One thing I’ll give modern electronic maps is their zoomability (is that a word? It is now).
Filtering through a few options, I was finally able to spot this cluster of piers, located at the port of Dafeng. That put me just slightly north of course.
Finally, I reached the shoreline. But, thirty seconds over China and I was already stymied by its enormity. What looked to be a few dozen miles on the chart stretched out before me like an endless patchwork, all the way to the horizon.
As the minutes ticked by, I felt like I should have spotted the field already, but in every direction all I could see were those curiously narrow fields.
I did, at long last, pick up the field after a fair bit of looking, nestled in the heart of the cityscape. Something about the size of the fields particularly made the world somehow feel…bigger.
An interesting bit of Forced Perspective illusion. 
Since I had stayed up high to find the field, I had a fair bit of descending to do. So, I just set myself up for a very high key and spiraled down to Yancheng with as little power as I thought prudent for the engines well being!
After what was probably a needlessly long final (even for me), I set down on Runway 22.
And taxied over to the ramp for a… Huh, if US fields always had a place to get sliders at the base of the tower, I wonder what Chinese fields had?
And there you have it. I’ve made it to China.
My deadline to get most of my flying done was approaching. I was now in range of Daocheng Yading.
And the loadmaster just happened to find a bottle of Soju.
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Nice, I have a bottle of Hibiki upstairs…in case of emergency!
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Very much true
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Aspen - Salt Lake City in the IRIS PC21. I flew this leg a couple of weeks ago. I’m really going to have to get a move on.
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Well, at least you’re doing it in style!
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Right then, You’re with me. My treat.
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OK, without ever having been there, I know their food has to be good.
You don’t get crowds like that waiting for take-away if it isn’t?
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So, it’s actually a full restaraunt, too. it was so good they finally opened a second location. BOTH have about an hour wait to get in. It blew Guy Fieri away on Diners, Drive-in’s, and Dives. Best Mexican food I’ve ever had- and I used to live in both in Justin Texas and Phoenix AZ.
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my dilemma now, fly or report 
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