Over the years, I’ve flown in and out of a specific airport on numerous occasions, day and night. It’s a well-equipped facility, featuring a tower and a local approach control, along with scheduled service, multiple gates, two full-service FBOs and three runways. The nearby attractions are interesting when I want to stop, the food choices are excellent and the airport is a great choice for conducting practice approaches. There’s only one problem: I can’t find it at night.
The first time I encountered this problem, I was flying a borrowed airplane, building time. I arrived from the south, and the runway in use required reversing direction. I was very close in on a visual approach before I spotted the airport’s relatively weak beacon and, as I complied with the controller’s vectors, I wound up on a high right downwind. As I flew parallel to the runway, I finally was able to spot it. I completed the right-hand pattern and touched down without further ado.
