Bolder - Perkins / Cessna 182RG II / VFR

I was looking for a nice little flight this afternoon and this seemed as good as any. I planned a 180° turn after take-off in order to avoid the Las Vegas Class B, and that worked nicely. I climbed to 5500 and made my way out over Lake Mead; in the FP I had mentioned following the shoreline, but in fact I stayed mostly in the middle of the lake, until I cut across the hills to Echo Bay and then up to Perkins, which saved some time.

I'm doing better and better at maintaining altitude. Sometimes I'm right on the dot for many minutes at a time. Unfortunately, pesky updrafts and downdrafts sometimes mess up my perfectly trimmed altitude, and I have to retrim or tweak the throttle. Still, I'm much better than I used to be.

There was a small amount of turbulence just before I arrived at Perkins. Not a big deal. Very smooth landing. It seems that the lower I can get my landing speed, the smoother things go, which I guess makes sense. I'm also trying to configure flaps and lower gear later so that I don't waste a lot of fuel coming in like a slowpoke while still 15 miles out.