Due Up

Evening Outings

Looking over the nose with the Kenai peninsula on the right and the Chugach mountains on the left.  The water is the Turnagain Arm of the Cook Inlet. The inlet was first explored by Europeans in 1778 when James Cook sailed into it while searching for the Northwest Passage. It was named after Cook in 1794 by George Vancouver, who had served under Cook in 1778. Turnagain Arm was named by William Bligh of HMS Bounty fame. Bligh served as Cook's Sailing Master on his 3rd and final voyage, with the aim to discover the Northwest Passage.
Upon reaching the head of Cook Inlet, Bligh was of the opinion that both Knik Arm and Turnagain Arm were the mouths of rivers and not the opening to the Northwest Passage. Under Cook's orders Bligh organized a party to travel up Knik Arm, which quickly returned to report Knik Arm indeed lead only to a river.
Afterwards a second party was dispatched up Turnagain Arm and it too returned to report only a river lay ahead. As a result of this frustration the second body of water was given the disingenuous name "Turn Again". Early maps label Turnagain Arm as the "Turnagain River".

I stopped off at a gravel bar around 10pm for some hot noodles, some crackers, and a stretch of the legs.  I had flown to Whittier, which was little more than a shipping yard on the other side of Portage Pass as one is heading southeast from Anchorage.   There was a moose on a gravel bar nearby, but a couple of approaches to the nearest landing spot proved too tight for me to get in for a landing.  Fortunately, this bar did not disappoint as the sunset progressed.

Flying home around 11pm I was mesmerized by the awesome sunset.  God has a paintbrush!

Anchorage while on approach to Merrill Field Airport.  Until tomorrow--

I Have Arrived

The new Firman pod is on, and now I just need more junk to stuff in it.  It'll carry extra fuel, survival gear, donuts, and a shrubbery-- a pretty one-- not too expensive.

Making maximum use of the real estate for take off.

31 inch Alaska Bushwheel Tundra tires make a good platform for using a little water on landing

A gravel bar playground

Bird's eye view of the landing strip in the middle of the river, just long enough.

I required stopping on this gravel bar for a PB&J sandwich.

You stopped short?!  That's my move!  (Seinfeld anyone?!?...)

Fun landing spot with a water approach and a couple snags sticking out.

Heading North

Heaps of stuff have been crammed into every nook and cranny, and it's time to go.  I have everything I can think of.  Kinda low on food though.  If I had ham I could have ham and eggs, if I had eggs.  I was planning to fly to Alaska on the Alaska Highway, but got talking with a friend Loni a couple days ago and learned he was headed up with his friend Mark, both in supercubs a couple days after I was planning to go.  So it was decided to be a caravan of three.  I met them in central WA at noon on Satuday.  High noon.

My new headquarters for the summer.

After clearing customs in Kelowna, British Columbia, and while enroute to Quesnel, we take a little time to land at a gravel bar.  Loni Habersetzer, in the middle, teaches off-airport flying.    Loni can make something impossible look graceful in his supercub.  He's a personable guy that's fun to hang out with.  Check out his webpage in my Links section.  Mark has the other supercub and Loni and he have been friends for years, and Mark has some good years of experience behind a supercub.  Good times all around-

Quesnel, British Columbia.  Campfire and a tent for the night.  Good sleepin'

Smithers, B.C.  Where the women are a kind of Lake Wobegon variety and the men are trying to hold their planes down from the wind.  This gal ran the gas truck.  It was only noon, and we were planning to make it to Whitehorse, Yukon by tonight.  Mother nature had other plans, and 60mph winds were just ahead of us on our route.  It was already bad enough, and we landed crosswise to the runway in the grass between the runway and the terminal because of the wind.  We stayed in Smithers for the night to wait for the wind to calm down, which it did the next morning.

Leaving Smithers, headed for Dease Lake, and then Whitehorse, Yukon.  The wind quit, but low clouds and rain/snow made things interesting.  A regional commuter couldn't land because cloud ceilings were about 300 feet off the ground.   We got a special VFR clearance and took off.

My $1.97 thermometer from Lowe's.  Hey, it works...

 

Mark taking off in his cub.

Northway, Alaska.  Back in the USA!  The weather between Whitehorse and Northway was dicey.  We started as a flight of 3, but Loni and I got separated from Mark in the mountains and poor visibility made it impossible to get re-connected.  We ended up taking different canyons, and Mark had to land on a gravel bar because the weather forced him down.  So we arrived a couple hours before him in Northway, and he made it in later.  Northway was out of fuel (not entirely uncommon in AK) but a supply truck arrived just before we left, so we didn't have to use our spare cans we carried.  The bus driver arrived while we were waiting.  He looked just like "Otto" from "The Simpsons."

The visibility through the pass goes down a bit

I landed in Merrill Field, Anchorage, Alaska and got out of the plane to find a rainbow in the background.  How cool is that?

SuperCub N897SP

It's a 1955 Piper SuperCub, and it's family has explored the ends of the continents.  Let's see if it's got another 'round of exploration in it--