Fuel stop - Riverview, MILeft the sunny outer banks just as the weather was moving in. Wound our way around Philly, NYC and Chicago airspace cutting through cold fronts and dodging smaller systems as we flew west.
Crossed the Mississippi and stopped in Waterloo, Iowa for fuel but then couldn't quite get going again. Turns out the starter failed on the airplane. The fuel-injected system makes hand-propping a huge chore so we asked the folks in Kamloops to ship one out to us overnight.
Unfortunately, the Men In Brown let us down and lost the package in Kentucky. On the bright side, turns out there’s lots to do in Waterloo and Cedar Falls. John Deere’s Engine Works and large tractor assembly plant are located there. It’s also home to the National Cattle Congress, the hometown of the most unfortunate Sullivan brothers as well as the home airfield of Johnathan Livingston - one of the most accomplished pilots of the golden age of aviation.
We headed off for a tour of the John Deere assembly plant. It’s the biggest assembly plant in the US after Boeing’s 747 plant in Everett, WA. They make the really big tractors there. The ones with tires 10’ tall. And the ones with tracks. It was pretty cool to tour the factory floor and see those huge chassis get turned into tractors.
New starter should show up in the morning and with any luck we’ll be headed west again before noon.
Cedar Falls, Iowa 
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