Trip Story

I hardly slept at all the night before I left, I had been planning that day for so many months that I was filled with nervous excitement. The overcast cloud layer did not burn off until 11 a.m. but I had some rare Northbound Tailwinds that allowed me to make a Non-Stop 5 hour flight to land in Troutdale on the East side of Portland. I chose that spot because there was a hotel right on the airport and restaurants just a few blocks away. When I called the hotel and asked for their best price they told me that $135 was the absolute best they could do and then during my registering I told them I flew in and they said oh we have a special price of $106 for Pilots!

Under low clouds I went North 6 miles from Troutdale to Grove Field and fueled up at a dollar less per gallon than the Troutdale Airport. From there I headed up the Columbia Gorge the cloud bases were at 2000 feet and some strong headwinds were coming down the Gorge but it was beautiful to fly over the Cascade Locks. Marveling at the enormity and power of the Columbia River. After about 40 miles I was able to turn north toward Yakima and on to Lake Chelan.                                                                                                                                                                                

Lake Chelan is a beautiful and narrow 50 mile long Lake. I circled along the shore lines, in amazement and also looking for a suitable dock or beach where I could pull up to take a break and eat my lunch. The beaches I saw looked  private or blocked by  swimming areas  and most all of the docks were the type that use piers driven into the ground and extending up through the dock, but when docks are made that way a float plane cannot come up to it because the wing would hit the piers that come up above the dock.  Thus, I was looking for floating docks with no piers and there were very few to choose from. I found one that looked like it was coming off of a public park but when I tied up to it it had “private property, association members only” written all over it. I used the restroom and hoped that I could have a relaxing lunch before someone asked me to leave, but a security guard showed up in no time and told me that I had to leave immediately before some of the association members on the hill called and he got in trouble. So I ate my lunch a drift and then headed up to Omak for fuel.

I had less than 45 minutes fuel when I got there and unfortunately there was a big black thunderstorm off to the West creating a really strong crosswind. Most of the time I would not land at an airport with a crosswind that strong but I needed the fuel so I took the chance and it went quite smoothly. With a wind like that I land at a diagonal across the runway, touching down on one side and slowing enough to turn down the runway before going off the other side. As I was finishing fueling The heavy rain from the thunderstorm started and I chose to take off immediately and get out of the way because I did not know how long I would be stuck there if I tried waiting it out. As I took off I called flight service on the radio and opened my border crossing Flight Plan. I told him I was early opening the flight plan because of a big storm and he told me that that thunder cell was predicted to have 2 1/2 inch hail coming out of it!

I had a beautiful flight up to Penticton. For customs into Canada I had called to schedule my arrival appointment the day before and then on arrival the procedure is to stay in your plane and telephone them to see if they will be coming out to do an inspection or taking your word for it that everything is in order. I had a 40-minute wait to get through to them but they said they were not coming out. I grabbed my overnight things and decided to walk to lodging for the fun of it rather than taking a taxi, I was just really enjoying my arrival in Canada. About a mile down the road I came across a funny little group of storefronts overlooking the lake and one of them was called The “Angry Vegan”. I had a fabulous Buddha bowl there and overheard some talk about yurt rentals next door. Next thing you know I am sleeping in a cute little yurt. I really liked it but what I didn’t realize was that a yurt has very thin walls and I was sleeping a quarter mile from the runway and a hundred yards from the highway. Luckily I was so tired I slept extremely soundly.

I woke up early and excited to be on my trip. But I had some hesitation because I really did not have the next leg planned. I had tried talking to some local pilots when I got in but they all said “oh, you need to talk to a float pilot,” and none were around. I hung around the flight school and Flight Club hoping to get some recommendations about lakes and next stops farther north but even though I met a number of great people I was not getting many recommendations. I did get told by one pilot that Salmon Arm wood be a good place to overnight and it had good fishing around it so even though that was only a few hours North it sounded like an interesting place to stop. Sightseeing was breathtaking going up the Okanagan Valley.

I was not expecting the enormity of the volcanic mountains around the lake or the way it looked so much like Italian Hill Country with all the vineyards and orchards scattered on the hillsides. I went through a number of good rain showers and was enjoying being in a different weather region than California. Salmon Arm was great, I spent a lot of time talking to local pilots and was invited into their daily 3pm coffee meeting. And yes, there was the point early on when one of the guys in a loud stern voice said down the table to me “We’ve got a question and you better have the right answer!” In my younger days I might have gone into deer in headlights mode but I know when your having a friendly BS session a blustery statement like that means we are going to play around now. So as I expected he said “Are you a Republican or a Democrat!?” And yes I said absolutely a Democrat and I went on with how Trump is destroying the US and the world and any trust in the US or our government. They jumped in with a bunch of Trump jokes and we had a lot of good laughs.

I got a lot of great advice about some of the areas around there and the lakes but I still did not have float plane pilots to talk to. For a $30 donation I did get the Flying Club loaner car and it was great to go into town and have mobility.

It really poured hard a few times while I was in town, one store that I went into had a very interesting roof line, when I went in I thought it was just a shade and rain cover extending out into the parking lot but when I came out there was a big downpour and the roof overhang was designed to take all the water off the roof and make a waterfall when it rains!

When I got up the radar was showing a big band of thunderstorms and rain moving through to the North and it looked like it would not give me a break until after 11 so I took my time and ran some errands. Out at the airport the Flying Club was setting up to have a air show the next day. I took my time straightening things up and organizing with the plane and visiting with a lot of people that came by to admire Double Shot.

When I took off there we’re still many layers of clouds in the valleys and occasional rain showers as I headed up toward a big North – South lake called Adams. About a third of the way up it really looked like the clouds were packing in the far end of the lake and I thought there was a good chance I would not get up through the saddle to the next valley. I went back a little ways and took a side valley to the West where I found less clouds and started to turn Northwest, but I still had a lot of clouds ahead of me so I landed at a nearby lake ( East Barrière Lake) to take a break. I found a little beach to tuck behind out of the wind and have lunch.

I took off and headed west out over the North Thompson River Valley. It was breathtaking to come out over the mountains and to be so high above the deep deep valley –  it looked like something from Switzerland. Also the river had an enormous amount of water and power coming through it it was fascinating to watch from the air.

As I got farther up following the Clearwater River it, too, was amazingly powerful with an extremely large volume of water. It has many waterfalls and rapids.  One of the biggest is Helmcken Falls.  It is 460 ft. straight down. I continued up to Azure Lake and it was gorgeous.  The only problem was a lot of wind was coming up the gorge and it made my landing choices very difficult. I had looked at the lake many times on satellite but to be there in the canyon with the cascading rivers coming down the mountain faces from the snow and even one glacier above was awesome! I did land and tuck into a little cove out of the wind but it was difficult to find a place for the plane. I was very worried about the strong winds pushing the plane into the rough rock and tree-lined shoreline all around if I had any problem starting it. From there I headed down to 108 Mile House to get some fuel and check into the bed and breakfast that Julie had texted me was waiting. It was over an hour flight and had quite a good deal of turbulence along the way. I taxied up to the pumps and while my mind was focused on the pumps and what I was going to do next, my left hand was shutting down the plane and flipping off switches on the panel.  To my shock and surprise, I flipped the landing gear switch and retracted the landing gear up into the floats dropping the plane and the floats onto the concrete. I walked over to a big hangar that I saw open and found several fireman inside. I told them I had done something really stupid and would very much appreciate some help. They were fabulous. I asked them for blocks of wood and a floor jack and they started gathering up big planks of lumber and marching to the plane. I directed them on lifting up one end of the plane and then the other as I kept adjusting boards under the floats so we could kind of teeter totter it back up into the air. It actually worked and I got the gear back down with only cosmetic damage to the floats!

The bed and breakfast I stayed at “Acro Lodge” was fabulous. The house was immaculate and the bed with its warm duvet was extremely comfortable.  After a wonderful continental breakfast I took a long hot sauna and tried to put the bad shut down behind me. Up at the airport I met several other pilots including one who also said I needed to talk to a float pilot and drove me down to Mike’s house. Mike is building his third experimental float-plane and told me about his favorite lakes nearby. We talked about all kinds of flying stuff for quite a while and then he gave me a golf cart ride with his old dog running alongside back up to Double Shot. I chose to go to one of the larger easy lakes that he recommended not too far away, but again it was quite windy and I was not comfortable with any of the shoreline there to tie up on to. I drifted and fished a little bit but didn’t catch anything. Mostly I needed practice fishing from the float and managing all the fishing gear.

The B&B did not have a room for that night so I thought I would just go to the old Resort Lodge across the street. They charged me way too much for a shabby dingy old room with hardly any lights and no ventilation. I spent a lot of time swatting all the mosquitoes that were on the walls and ceiling in the room to reduce how many I would be feeding while I slept. I then went down to ask about dinner and found out their restaurant is closed, on Monday nights and there is nothing in walking distance. I went back to the plane and got my camping food but when I tasted the water in the room it was horrible! I went down and asked about the water and I was told that because of the high magnesium in their water they have to add salt to keep their pipes from plugging up and my only option was to buy 12 oz bottles at $2.50 each from the vending machine. I was rather upset by that thought but I knew it wasn’t the clerk’s fault. I started pacing the lobby in circles like a lion at the zoo. I saw two bicycles outside and asked if those were available for me to use and go to the gas station for water. She said it would be a $30 rental…. (I counted to ten) I said it seems like that could be waived considering the circumstances. She started talking in a whisper the way people do when they’re afraid of getting caught and said that her manager is on site and she could lose her job but if I signed the rental form and got the bike back without her manager noticing she would throw the form away but if the manager was there when I returned she would charged me $30.

The bike was in horrible shape – tires were almost flat, one brake barely worked and the handlebars were quite crooked to the front wheel. As I started off to the store it started raining, (hard). I got my gallon of water at the store and it was a long uphill ride and walk in the rain back to my room. She was waiting outside and very excited that her manager had not come by and I had gotten away with it.

Well, back over at the plane I met even more people.  All the pilots were very friendly and full of advice. One of them, Willie, was especially amazing. He is a float-plane pilot that used to fly charter in the area and has a private cabin on a remote lake. He told me I was welcome to go out and use his cabin! He showed me some pictures and it looked nice. He drew a little sketch of how to fly into the lake where to park and where the rocks are hiding just under the water surface. He also told me about some of his other favorite lakes, a few of which were close by and one had also been recommended by Mike the day before. Based on that I decided I would be going out to Lang Lake and he said there is a forest service cabin there that I could use also.

Weather looked good.  I had not only checked it myself, but I had spoken to the flight service station personnel and they told me it would just be some very light rain and not much wind that day. I found a nice little spot to tie up where a creek was coming out and where I was protected from the wind that was coming down the length of the lake. I did some fishing and was catching rainbow trout and squaw fish (a boney fish that is very oily (my net still smells),(a week and 6 feet away). Next thing I know, I hear thunder and see lightning in the distance across the lake! It started raining and I put more rocks on my anchor line and put out a second line but I was still pretty well protected from the wind coming down the lake. I was having some lunch in the cockpit and trying to wait out the storm that had a lot of thunder and lightning when I noticed the bushes on the shore all lay down in a strong wind. The wind was now coming directly across the lake and hitting the side of the plane wanting to push it back into the trees and shoreline behind it. I jumped out and held the line to keep the plane from getting blown back into the shore but all I could do was ball up in the wind and rain to keep as warm as I could but there was no way to let go or move to get a different line out and no trees or anything in the right direction that I could tie to. I was balled up there holding that line for over a half hour hoping that the wind would not get any stronger and finally it began to lighten up. I was able to work my way back to the plane and get a hold of the second line so I could get the plane offshore by wadding out with it and across the creek and pointing it more into the wind so that there was not so much force pushing on it.

The wind continued to die down over the next hour (that’s how I got the above photo). I was quite cold and soaked and decided to taxi the plane down the lake and check out the forest service cabin.

It looked like it would provide shelter but that was about it.

There was a little bit of firewood but nothing to split it with. I always travel with basic emergency camping gear so I figured I would pitch my tiny tent in the cabin (that should keep the rodents and mosquitoes off of me). The rain was lightening up.  Finally after about an hour I could see the cloud ceiling lifting to the West at the other end of the lake. After a little while it looked like I could get past some of the clouds down there so I packed up and took off. It worked out well.  I made sure I always had a place to turn around and go back or land on another lake and I found my way through the low clouds and back to 108 Mile Airport. I loaded up the things that I had left in one of the guy’s lock-box and flew down to 100 Mile Airport, that is pretty much on the Main Street in the center of town. I got a fabulous room at half the price of what I paid the night before and I had a good hot meal at the “Gourmet Burger Rednecks” restaurant.

 

First thing in the morning I was finishing the payrolls for work that I had started the evening before, checking in with people at work and preparing payroll reports for the owner. I was watching the internet weather and it did not look good. The skies were going to be relatively clear but high winds were forecast that would make flying around the mountains and landing on the water no fun. I decided to just have a down day and sort out and dry out a lot of things from the plane that had been getting all mixed up and rather wet. As I was sorting out the plane I noticed a guy over working on his back country plane in the grass. His name was Travis and his parents have had four cabins on remote lakes in the area that they would fly fishing guest out to for guided fly-fishing trips. Travis was the float plane pilot for them for many years but he said the cost of liability insurance was too much for the small number of charter flights they were doing. He told me about a lot of fishing lakes in the region and he found a map of that next region north that I would need to go to Willie’s cabin the next day. I started to tell him something about myself and he said “ho, I know all the other airport guys and firemen told me about you”.

I also used a majority of the day to figure out how to post the first six days of my trip. I was looking forward to a good dinner at one of the places with higher reviews in town because practically every restaurant is closed on Sunday and Monday in the region and it was finally now Tuesday. Even on Tuesday places close at 8 so I made sure at I was walking to the other end of town to a restaurant. When I got there a sign in the window said they were not serving dinner that night and were closed. I then walked back to the other end of town where I was confident a different restaurant would be open but by the time I got there it was just after 8 and they were closed. I then tried a bar and grill that was open but they were only serving drinks. I went back down to the other end of town (again) by the freeway and found a donut  shop kind of place that had just enough soup left in the steam warming tray to give me a small bowl of cream of potato. So that and a glass of water was dinner!

It was going to be another day with a lot of clouds around, some rain showers and thunderstorms in the afternoon but I had decided to go out to Willie’s cabin and  I grabbed a few things  from the store.  The  cooking oil is for frying fish and  the potatoes are for hash browns in bacon grease.

It did turn out to be a pretty good flight there.

And it is a beautiful lake that his cabin is on.

Click on this link for a video of flying in and out of the lake

After a great night’s sleep I made myself a hearty breakfast and began straightening and packing up.

I did some extra clean up on the cabin and left some supplies there for Willie. It is amazing how long it takes me to get things packed up and in the plane.

When I finally got going, it was just a gorgeous lake to fly out of. As you can see in the departure part of the video on yesterday’s report, right after takeoff you are already almost 2,000 feet above Quesnel Lake. I descended down to about 800 feet above the lake and continued West. I did not have a agenda I just was planning on ending up at Crooked Lake for some fishing. I noticed a beautiful river inlet with a beach and a waterfall up above that looked like a great spot to fish so I dropped down and did some fishing there. The fishing was great.  I not only was catching large rainbow, I also caught a very large brown trout. I then continued flying down the lake and exploring other side river inlets. I did not choose to land at another one, but I was really enjoying the gorgeous sightseeing and low-level flying around the shoreline. I then started in the direction of Crooked Lake but there was a big black rainstorm between me and that valley so I flew around horsefly lake looking for a another place to fish. A few times when I would see a protected river Inlet and go down low to take a close book I would find either a small tent camp or someone with a small boat tied up there and fishing already. So I headed farther to the southwest and circled around the rainstorm to get over to Crooked Lake. I noticed some type of a lodge at the far West end and about five miles down at the other end of the lake there was a gorgeous large river inlet delta where I landed and dropped anchor. Fishing was good for small rainbows but it wasn’t long before that big rainstorm got to where I was and I dragged the anchor into quite shallow water before it hooked up on something. I waited out the rain storm and moved back out after finally getting and enormous tree branch unhooked from the anchor. I did some more fishing and drifting and another smaller rain storm came through. Then I noticed a small boat with two guys had come all the way down the lake and were coming right up to me. They asked if I was okay and I said of course just fishing. They explained that my wife had called the resort because my satellite tracker was not sending any data and she was worried about me. I thanked them for making the very long trip and told them I at least owe them a lot of of beer and some gas. They were extremely nice and said they were just happy that I did not have any problem and was enjoying fishing. I asked them about the resort and if there might be a room, they thought so and I packed up and flew down to the resort. I met the owners, Kim and Al, at the shore and they said they had a small cabin for me. I then spent a long time unloading the plane and getting it secured for the night because there were more strong wind rain storms passing through.

Kim made a fabulous gluten-free dinner for me and I had a great time visiting with her and Al. We then went down and hung out around the campfire telling stories until almost midnight with the two guys that came to my rescue.

 

I had a great night’s sleep and woke up to a gorgeous morning. The shower in that bath house was much colder than I expected but I managed to get through it. I then went up and add a another fabulous gourmet meal with Kim’s cooking. When I was leaving I went over to say goodbye to Kim by the bath house and she asked me if I had taken a shower that morning, she then told me that she just noticed the water heater temperature been left on vacation and she hoped it wasn’t too cold. I told her that I just thought you Canadians must be really tough.

I took off heading about 80 miles south for Pendleton Lake. It has a cabin on it that Travis and his dad rent out to float planes and it is supposed to have good fishing. It also looked quite interesting with many fingers and islands. Of course as I got close there was a big black rainstorm right around the lake so I continued farther south to check out Donnell Lake that I had also heard was only accessible by float plane. I did some low tree line passes at Donnell but I did not like the way the winds were coming in across the mountain at the departure end and chose not to land. Back over at Pendleton the rainstorm had moved enough that I was able to get in and land. The fishing was good and the scenery was spectacular it is a gorgeous pristine lake.

I taxied down and looked at the cabin for a possible trip next year and it looked very nice. I was just a little concerned about the dock and shoreline because it was full of big sharp rocks. Late in the day I took off and flew through a number of heavy rain showers getting back to 108 Mile for some fuel and to pick up the extra gear I had left in a locker. I then flew down to 100 Mile and had a good dinner at the Firehouse Diner.