The route

2000 miles is a lot of range, but it's still only about one tenth of the way around the globe! The FIA definition of a circumnavigation of the globe is the length of the Tropic of Cancer, which is 19,863 nautical miles. I need to make sure I can plot a route that exceeds that distance, while having no more than about 1600 miles between stops.

A few hours of doodling later, I came up with this:







I start from my home town GA airfield in Minnesota, and then go west because prevailing winds tend to help in that direction.

The first challenge was actually figuring out a route through the Rockies in an unpressurized airplane! X-Plane simulates the effects of oxygen deprivation, and in testing, any attempt to climb above 13,000 feet didn't work out very well for me.

My original plan was to hit Denver, but the terrain forced me to go to Salt Lake City instead.