Halloween Fright Flight

Plans for Halloween included a flight up to Middletown Delaware's Summit Airport, EVY, and back again. I was flying the Sierra and the weather looked pretty good for the flight based upon my briefing. I got into the air and headed north toward Summit. There were a few bumps along the way but I expected that from the Sierra due to its light wing loading. As I got closer to Summit I began to call out my location over their UNICOM. Another aircraft was calling and concerned that I was en route to land because it appeared to be in a position and hold on the active runway. This is very unusual for a non-towered airport and probably why he was calling me. As I got closer to the airport the other plane cleared the runway and departed. I was faced with another problem. As I descended to pattern altitude the air became much rougher. The bumps required roll, pitch and yaw inputs to try and hold the aircraft steady. I'm not sure if it was a wind shear or just some gusts. Whatever it was it was going to make a stabilized approach a real problem. As I was fighting with the controls to maintain some semblance of straight and level, the engine momentarily started to lose power. The RPM's dropped off and I thought I was about to experience an engine failure. I was pretty confident of my ability to make a forced landing without an engine if I had to but doing it in this turbulence would scare me. Even before I turned on the Aux. Fuel Pump the engine RPM's had come back up again. Nothing but a momentary hiccup. Now it became time to decide about trying to land. I knew that I had enough fuel on board to head somewhere else. I really didn't need to land at Summit and I didn't want to try and land a light airplane at an airport I had visited only once in a Cessna. I climbed out of the pattern and headed southwest toward Ridgely and more familiar territory.
Once I got closed to Ridgely the air seemed to smooth out for me. There was a crosswind at the airport to test my skills but the landing went well. After a short rest at the airport it was time to head back to Bay Bridge. The approach and landing were slightly more tricky due to the bumpy crosswinds. In the end I saw firsthand how a lighter plane such as the Sierra flies in relation to an aircraft that it almost twice as heavy. The winds can really push you around when you're small.