Heaven is spelled "Seldovia"

Day 13, part 1: Homer to Seldovia to Talkeetna

The Mooney-flying Alaskan hosts I met last week suggested that I take at least a half-day to explore Seldovia, a hamlet across Kachemak bay from Homer. Given their favorable report of taking their Mooney (decidedly a fair off-pavement airplane with its low prop-to-ground clearance) to its gravel runway, I decided to give it a try. The brief visit would be one of the highlights of the trip.

After breakfast and another walking tour of Homer we came across a place everyone in town raved about: Two Sisters Bakery. I am a sucker for really well-done pastries, and a snob when it comes to mediocre ones, and this place was as good as I've had anywhere. It beats my favorite place close to home, Schat's, and that's no small feat. I point at a large sticky bun covered in cinnamon goo and pecans to my wife. She comes back with that, a large chocolate bread roll that's more chocolate than bread, a heavenly roll, and tall coffee. The B&B breakfast had nothing wrong with it, but this really started the day!

Fueled, we walked back to the airplane. The baby Eagle was still hanging out in the nest, not making any attempts to fly this morning. Walking past the water aerodrome the way to the airport, we caught a float plane starting its takeoff run - the loaded C185 (or 206?) took much longer in time and distance than I was seeing with solo Super Cubs at Lake Hood, taking most of the lake to get airborne.

Back at Homer airport I find the FSS and the briefer reminds me of Chris, the DJ character on Northern Exposure. I think he knew Santa Cruz too, not surprising. He provided a leisurely briefing, and had a few good stories to tell about life, the local music scene, and our new favorite bakery. I promise I'll come back to file after making a hop to Seldovia w/o flight plan as i'll be in radio contact, or should be, the whole time.

Yesterday we landed after flying IFR from Anchorage, with the assumption that the weather that rained on us camping the night prior would clear, and eventually it did, providing a nice clear sky to the west yesterday evening. Today that's gone. Its high overcast -- ceiling 7000' or so, with occasional rain due to a nearly stalled warm front stretching across the Cook Inlet off of a low off to the west - the weather breaks between storms don't last very long, though thankfully this next storm is weaker. You could just see the showers obscuring the horizon where Augustine Island's volcano was visible in the clear last night. Despite this, the weather is fundamentally good, and should be good VFR for our Seldovia hop, and then back up to Talkeetna in the late afterrnoon.

By the time we're airborne its past 11. Oh well, lazy tourists on sabbatical and all.

I want to show my wife glaciers from above while the opportunity presented itself. This won't be like the northern side of the Wrangell-St. Elias range like the week before, but several glaciers in Kenai Fjords park make their way down toward Katchemak bay from the icefield above, visible from on the ground at Homer. In the air and going across the bay, my wife quickly spotted a large pod of whales off the right wing during climbout. On to the glaciers, she was quite impressed, but I had to hold back as the grandeur from last weeks' overflight was still on another level.

After zipping up and down a few glaciers we turned down the coast for the quick trip to Seldovia. The coastline opposite Homer is dotted with occasional signs of man, wooded islands, and still inlets. A truly beautiful place. About 10 miles to go to Seldovia, and we noticed that the rain shower across the Cook Inlet is now closer. Not a thick shower, but its apparent there's a good chance we'll get rained on if we go to Seldovia, walking around for a few hours. Doubt creeps into my mind. This feeling, like an old lazy bum, would prefer to sit and watch airplane videos on youtube instead of doing anything productive. He even gets a word in, asking my wife if she really wants to walk around in the rain again. Now the doubt is in her mind. Somehow I push the doubt out of my mind. We're here, this place has been recommended, we've got the right gear, who cares if we walk around all afternoon in the rain?.

Seldovia airport is just over 1,800' of gravel, with trees on both ends of the runway, separated from the runway with 200' & 500' "safety areas" of water. Before even contemplating going in there, I dug out my airplane's flight manual with its paltry set of 1960s performance charts and saw that at maximum gross weight, the airplane should be able to land and takeoff again in less than half the runway. The "book numbers" provide no provision for an unpaved surface, soft-field technique, and ginger acceleration to keep the propeller free of dings from rock. I knew from prior experience at my home field what the airplane will do (when I don't screw up), and decide that the 100% safety margin (1,800' vs 900') should be sufficient. I'm also about 10% under maximum weight, which will help. Still, its a small runway and requires that a pilot new to the area be on their 'A' game and abort the landing (or subsequent takeoff) if certain parameters that will affect distance are not met.

We arrive and I decide to fly an entire pattern to scope out the field - starting on the upwind leg - at about 1,000' AGL. Looks doable, so we try for the landing. Wind is calm down here, so no need to worry about gust factor. Final at 75mph slowing to 70 during the slight dog-leg turn through the clearing in the trees. Touchdown isn't smooth but is within a couple airplane lengths of the start of the runway after chopping the power and we get off about half way down, right where all the locals do later when I get to watch them land. Who says you can't get a Mooney into a short strip?

The walk into Seldovia is where our first inklings of what a special place this is - finally getting a taste of real Alaska. A large aluminum drainage pipe runs under the road leading from the airport 1/4 mile to down. At the base of it is a pool of later about 3' deep and 15' in diameter. It is filled with Salmon, the stream form it to the ocean barely enough for one to scoot by due to the relatively low tide. Is this little drainage and creek their actual spawning run?



A couple hundred yards later we cross a bridge going to town, where the real bonanza starts: hundreds of Salmon hover in the shallow inlet. A fellow comes by to fish from the bridge and snags one on the gill while reeling in his lure. Like shooting fish in a barrel. A boy and girl each start to fish, and will later be rewarded with dinner for a family. A true bounty. The inlet is postcard perfect itself, with houses perched above the water on high pilings due to the large tidal swings, rowboats moored nearby.

We spent the next couple hours expiring the quiet town - accessible by air or sea, in intermittent rain. Pushing that doubt aside was the best move we made all day. Life moved more slowly here. Another case where the photos do the talking.

Downtown Seldovia

Back at the airport, a Cessna 180 landed as we had a late lunch getting ready to go. I didn't pay much attention until its occupants unloaded their cargo into the pickup truck next to us, and I saw a large set of fuzzy antlers protruding out.

"We got this on the North Slope. Have been making trips back and forth to haul the meat out."

I learned a bit about how to preserve Caribou for the several days that it took to get the meat back to where they'd landed their airplane, and then to shuttle it and their gear back across the state. The pilots, both retired airline guys, confirmed my intuition as far as the community and lifestyle were concerned.

"Seldovia is like Alaska twenty-five years ago" one remarked. I could identify with that being raised in rural west Hawai`i.

Before departing I paced the first half of the runway and picked out a go/no go spot where I expected to be airborne, and to plan my route of taxi and power application to avoid any large rocks. Fortunately a nice path that was mostly dirt occupied the southern end of the runway, allowing me to do a nice 180 at the end of the runway and not have to delay much in getting power applied on the takeoff roll. Going to full throttle with little to no ground speed tends to be worse for the propeller as an area of low pressure is created on the ground beneath it. Stones can literally be sucked into the prop. By bringing the power up slowly as the airplane gains speed, this is minimized.

Near Soldotna, northbound

The takeoff went as planned. I felt the main gear leave the ground just where I expected and I held the airplane in ground effect to get the gear up and accelerate to climb speed. A slight dog-leg to bypass the higher terrain and we were out, over the ocean again.

We flew back to Homer - taking all of 10 minutes - with the intention of getting gas, but I read the fuel price in error (mistaking the much cheaper jet fuel for avgas). We had enough to continue on, so I decided to again stop in Wasilla for gas before going on to Talkeetna, our next evening stop. The trip back up the Kenai was delightful, this time allowing us to get to know the landscape, and then on to Talkeetna as I did the week before.

Back in the air - IFR to Homer

Day 12: Seward to Anchorage to Homer

It rained all night. By morning we discovered a bit of a leak in the tent rain fly, and the and foot box of sleeping bags a bit wet - luckily the down inside still dry.. need to fix that fly. The plan was to get rid of the rental car and resume travel in the airplane... the weather was supposed to clear out today. Supposed to!

We quickly tore down camp, ate breakfast in the nice large rain shelter, and hit the the road to try to return rental car at the main Anchorage (Ted Stevens International) airport by noon. I'd rented the car there despite leaving the airplane parked at Merrill field to save money ($40/day rental vs. $150...). A slight logistical pain, but now I had an excuse to fly from Merrill into Lake Hood (or Anchorage International), so I didn't mind. We got back to Merrill field around 1130, where I loaded the airplane as my wife drove the rental car back.

It was apparent the weather wasn't clearing out as quickly as forecast - it was supposed to be nice by now. Instead a cold front form a weakening low was slowly meandering north, now just past Homer. Anchorage had a ceiling around 900' broken with overcast just above. The weather was clearing from the south with our destination, Homer, reporting 2000' overcast. Another excellent briefing from the Kenai FSS suggested that even low-level VFR wouldn't work out as an area between Kenai and Homer tended to have very low ceilings in this circumstance. This leg, however, was one of the few where I could fly IFR without worrying about icing due to the lower terrain and minimum altitudes along the route.

The next step was getting from Merrill to Anchorage International. Geeky as it is, I thought it would be fun to land at Lake Hood strip, and then depart from Anchorage International. The two are joined by a taxiway that crosses a road.

At Merrill, I requested a special VFR clearance to get over to Lake Hood Strip. Many other operators were also requesting SVFR to get out of town. It was a good 10-minute delay waiting for IFR arrivals before the tower could launch departures, and the ensuing antics were amusing... a Cessna 180 requested SVFR just after me, and soon he asked that he'd be a flight of two with his buddy if that would speed things up. A couple of minutes later, another pilot called in and asked if they could be a flight of three... some impromptu formation flying briefings were happening, I'm sure. The controllers, however, did not mind and I'm assuming they all went on their merry way. Welcome to flying in Alaska!

The flight to Lake Hood was perhaps the shortest I've ever done. Its all of 4 miles. Takeoff, "cruise" at 800' for all of 30 seconds, with a little turn to give a tall building and radio antenna some room, and then you're on base to the Lake Hood Strip, swooping in low over Lake Hood before turning a nice, tight, half-mile final.

The controllers gave me helpful directions to taxi across several roads -- some with pilot-operated gates (click the mic on a certain frequency to open them), and then across something of a railroad crossing triggered by taxiing your airplane close to the road, with the arms that go down and everything. Again, very geeky to be excited about that, but I'll bet you would be too when you saw it for the first time. I taxied over to a GA parking area that I'd previously scoped out on the international airport side, reachable for a pedestrian - maybe 200 yards from the car rental area, which worked out well for our purposes. By the time all that was done, I'd "flown" 0.4 loggable hours for a 2-and-a-half minute flight.

After picking up my wife, and IFR clearance, we went through another taxi-gate to the "big" ramp with B747 freighters parked left and right, presumably exchanging their goods, or just stopping for fuel between their exotic ports of call in Asia and elsewhere in North America.

Lets review that depature one last time!

The flight to Homer was straightforward if lacking a nice view - we climbed into the clouds at 1,000', getting a bit of a break between layers once but otherwise just plain gray, sometimes rainy sky, though it was pleasantly smooth, cruising at 6,000'.

Sometime after passing Kenai, another aircraft from Anchorage passed me by somewhere in the gray ether, a Piper Navajo I think. A Mooney passed by a Navajo: sad, right? Well I was flying slow to save gas! ATC asked me to slow to minimum speed. I'd soon figure out why: Their radar coverage went down to 5,000' or so by Homer, so it was one airplane at a time on the approach. I slowed down to maybe a hundred knots, loafing along thinking I'd get my approach clearance soon enough. Then, 20 miles from Homer a "lifeguard" (air ambulance) flight checked on, also going to Homer.... there was no question there -- they have priority over me. Just as I thought I might have to hold, I was given holding instructions.

"Mooney five one mike, hold as published at the Homer VOR, expect further clearance at 2150, time now 2130".

Here I am, instrument rated for 11 years, practicing holds every 6 months as a currency requirement, and I get my first real hold, ever. I wasn't going to complain, I would have had to practice a hold next month to keep my currency once again anyway. After this excitement quickly wore off I realized there was no hold published at the Homer VOR, at least on any of the charts I had. Some back and forth with the controller produced a bizarrely-worded clearance that would make me actually think about the proper hold entry (parallel, thanks for asking).

As I finished the entry, the lifeguard flight landed and I was given approach clearance -- a DME arc to a localizer back-course. The winds were slack, but this was a few less miles to fly than the front course. More good practice, right? I flew a decent enough approach and broke out at 2,000' or so.

Back on the ground, we walked to downtown Homer, about 2.5 miles. At first I have to admit based on that walk of shoulder-less road, wondering if this town was worth the stop. Those feelings were quickly admonished when we came across an Eagles' nest near the center of town. A pair of Bald Eagles had raised two offspring there over the spring and they were the stars of town, as you couldn't miss them. A couple of friendly passerby's gave us the story: The two babies were now adolescents, nearly grown. One had flown by itself already and was off somewhere else. Both parents were sitting in a tree a hundred yards or so from the nest waiting for the other baby to fly. It would take a few test hops - getting maybe a foot or so off of a branch next to the nest, but wouldn't yet commit to flight. Apparently this had been the scene for some days, and people were wondering if the remaining Eagle would take flight, or eventually be abandoned as the parents moved on. A nearby marine life visitor center was another interesting diversion.

Adolescent Bald Eagle, Homer

Turning to lodging, we had a recommendation for an outfit that rented cabins but didn't receive a call-back. Homer, however, is full of B&Bs and a few minutes of walking and looking later we had a wonderful place not far from the ocean, perched over an art gallery.. my wife was pleased! The gallery and three-room B&B were owned by a very talented local artist, who from the appearance of things was also a successful entrepreneur. A rare(?) combination.

Homer seaplane lake

An Australian couple, retired, traveling with their mid 20s daughter occupied in room next door. They know how to travel and are enjoying retirement: Airline Melbourne to Seattle, the marine highway into Alaska, to King Salmon (according to them, a dissapointment), Homer, a week exploring the Kenai Peninsula to Anchorage, then across Canada and eventually home after visiting New York & the U.S. east coast in a month.

Fire Hydrant art, Homer

We took a walking tour of Homer and settled on a nice local pub for a most excellent burger & a brew for dinner. Between the local characters and art scene it was easy to see how Jewel got her start here.It was apparent between accomodation and dining that we had just missed the tourist wave.. life was quiet here, and presumably would be much more so once winter started to set in.

After dinner, a brief foray to the beach, where locals drive their trucks down to enjoy evening bonfires. Still plenty of light at 10pm, and the weather had finally cleared to the south and west allowing for a nice sunset, and interesting view of the volcanoes of Augustine Island and Mt. Iliamna poking up above the horizon on the opposite side of the Cook Inlet. The tide goes up and down over 30 feet here at its extreme. Amazing.

Tomorrow, Seldovia.