Denali color

Day 14: Talkeetna to Fairbanks

After a comfortable, if pricey, stay at the Talkeetna motel we decided to be on our way to make an attempt at seeing Denali from the air, and then proceed north to Fairbanks for a shot at seeing the aurora borealis the following night.

Back down main street once again, the Roadhouse was the place to be for breakfast, bursting at the seams with tourists - someone was making good money over the summer season. A takeout breakfast of hearty quiche, salmon-filled breakfast pastry (strange, but it worked!) and coffee from the Roadhouse got us going.

The view of Denali and the Alaska range from Talkeetna looked just the same as the day before and last week as well: solid gray clouds. North of the Alaska Range, however, the atmosphere was stable, dry, and warm. The plan was to fly north along the Chulitna river, through Windy pass, over the Denali park entrance that most folks would drive through, and then work our way to the north side of the range.

The views as we proceeded north and east from Talkeetna only grew sweeter as we proceeded north. Aspens lining streams at this latitude had their first tinges of yellow leaves, and soon ground and hillsides not covered in water or trees took on a more or less continuous deep red hue from the leaves of shrubs lining the slopes... the scale of it all was mesmerizing. We spotted another airplane going our way, what looked like a Cessna 180, and I decided to slow down a bit and follow.

Approaching Windy Pass

Windy Pass was a place I'd been warned about by the retired airline guys in their own C180 down in Seldovia... don't go through with more than 15 knots of wind. Comparing what the GPS was telling me with true airspeed on various headings, I figured we had just about 15 knots of wind. That was assuming a relatively low altitude, maybe 500-1000' above ground. Thankfully the ceiling was improving steadily and we were able to climb to about 3,000' above the ground while approaching the pass. Airspeed is life, and altitude is life insurance; money in the bank, and that would be enough to deal with a bad turbulence encounter. There ended up being a couple of moderate bumps, but nothing to worry about. Meanwhile I'd take a look at the other airplane we were following from time to time and noticed it was continuing along, maybe 1,000' above the ground or so, without looking like it had any trouble.

Denali

Rounding the corner through Windy we quickly approached Denali national park as is typically visited by someone driving. The weather was continuously improving as expected and we began a slow climb westward, more or less parallel to the park's roads as the ceiling improved, hoping to see Denali off in the distance. Climbing through 11,000' or so and approaching the Toklat River, The Great One finally came into view. Sadly, the angle of sunlight combined with the weather, now hemmed in but desperately trying to spill over from the south side of the range didn't work out for great photos.

Aspens line the Tolkat

From this altitude, our sight seeing was mainly limited to the peaks, glaciers, lay of the land, and abounding color of the region. While it was a fun flight, its a place I'd suggest visiting on the ground given its accessibility. Proceeding onward to Fairbanks, we enjoyed the push of the southwesterly wind on our back to cover ground at three nautical miles a minute. Along the way, the vast Aspen groves lining the Toklat were now a sea of gold; that one extra degree of latitude made a big difference in onset of season, versus Talkeetna.

Back on the ground, landing next to an old DC6 freighter on the parallel runway, we took a bit of time to explore Fairbanks. It offers lots of amenities, a reasonable rental car, but spending time in the town wasn't high on my list of touristic priorities. Still, enjoying a late lunch basking in warm sunshine (finally t-shirt weather!) next to the river that runs through town was fun.

A quick glance through the Milepost and we picked out Gold Dredge No 8 as as suitable tourist trap to go explore. Unfortunately it was closed when we got there, but along the way afforded a chance to see the Alaska pipeline (hooray, hydrocarbons!).

One interesting thing about ground exploration here was the trees were noticably petite. We would ultimately not continue further north on our trip, but eventually the trees die out all together as the forests end and the tundra begins. Sort of a timberline deliniated by latitude versus altitude, and nature's march towards desolate tundra was evident here.

On a friend's recommendation, we drove northwest of town to Murphy Dome to camp for the night. This hilltop provided a nice view of the Alaska range to the south. Sunset came around midnight, and I periodically awoke to try to see the aurora, which was forecast to occur at our latitude should the sky be dark enough. A pair of Moose slowly munched their way through dense brush not far away. Though darkness did eventually come to the southern sky, I didn't see the northern lights. The progression of twilight across the northern horizon was interesting, though: The sun set in the northwest, its light traversed the horizon, and rose in the northeast. It was as if just another good push to the north (or being here a few weeks earlier) would let us see the sun shine all night.

So ended our last evening in the state, at 65 degrees north latitude. The trip home would start, albeit way too soon, the next day.

Talkeetna Revisited

Day 13, part 2: Talkeeta

The remainder of the flight into Talkeetna was completely uneventful. No fog, no howling wind at Wasilla. Denali was still obscured by cloud, and the tour operators were still doing frequent turbine-Otter-on-skis departures as they had been on my first visit.

Wait -- Talkeetna. Again? I decided last week it was worth coming here with my wife. There are a precious few towns oriented to tourism that make me want to return for a second trip, but Talkeetna had some sort of magnetic pull associated with it. Some of it had to do with the airplanes and bush operators, some with the quirky things I saw in town, and without a doubt some probably had to do with the aviation history forged by the likes of the late Don Sheldon, legendary bush pilot based on Talkeetna whose business continues on in his name.

We arrived in the early evening hours, around 6pm, again not knowing where we'd stay. I saw a sign advertising a hostel not far from the airport and a quick walk in that direction and gaze from the muddy dirt road suggested that no, we'd spring for a hotel or find a place to camp the night. On the way into town from the airport road, I made the fortunate mistake of  looking in the direction of a warehouse with an open door. A friendly man with a hearty beard waved hello, and motioned us inside. You see, all you have to do to get Jerry's attention is to look his way.

Jerry, retired from the military aircraft industry in southern California came to Talkeetna to teach kids how to work on airplanes. Using donated airframes, tooling, parts, and monetary donations for supplies, Talkeetna Build a Plane gives high school aged kids an alternative to more traditional woodshop or auto repair classes. Various projects were under way, including skin and bulkhead work on a wrecked Cherokee Six fuselage that the prior owner had donated. Students get shown the ropes using scraps, and when their workmanship is solid are given a shot at working on the actual airplane projects themselves. Their work time is logged in an AMT logbook and I would imagine counts toward A&P certification if they are so inclined. Motivation in the form of flying lessons was part of the deal as well.

One thing that struck me as Jerry showed us all of this stuff, without us asking, and never even suggested that we give him or his organization a dime. I'm the type of person that gets turned off when solicited for donations, and his attitude of pride of the kids' accomplishments convinced me that their organization was worth donating to, something I did after returning home.

After parting ways with Jerry and picking up his recommendations for food and lodging we walked to town. The Roadhouse was full, no room at the inn, and the dining hall packed, but a few doors back was the West Rib Pub, which my formation-flying tour-guides had pointed out the week before. When we walked in, who did we see? Jerry again. After a brief chat I was introduced to another notable bush pilot, who ran Alaska Floats & Skis. We talked flying a bit, and what it takes to find a flying job in Alaska, for those so-inclined.

Some lucky networking completed, we sat down for a dinner of Caribou burgers and beer. I'd never seen a pub with a limit on how many beers someone could order right on the menu, but the 9% alc. Glacier Ice Axe Ale had a two-pint maximum. If you know me you'll know that I'm not a heavy drinker, but I did have a pint, and it did have a notable effect. We settled on an expensive -- but very nice -- motel down at the end of town and called it a night.

What a day. Some trips defined by just a few really outstanding days and this has been one, along with flying formation here with my Mooney pal several days ago, and the Wrangell-St. Elias overflight. Its setting in that this trip is one of the most rewarding that I've done. I'm eternally grateful for the opportunity to have flown here and to see the majesty of our planet.

Mooney fun in Talkeetna, introduction to Anchorage

Day 8: Palmer to Anchorage (Merrill field), Alaska

I was put in contact with a local Mooney owner by one of the Mooney parts suppliers I use in California. The owner, an A&P mechanic who had done an outstanding job restoring his M20C, and his lovely family made arrangements to meet me in Wasilla for fuel before flying our respective airplanes up to Talkeetna for lunch. As usual, the weather was interesting. The wind at Palmer and Talkeetna, dead calm. Wasilla, barely a 5-minute flight to the west of Palmer in similar geography, had wind gusting to well over 20 knots. Between Wasilla and Talkeetna, low fog (which we'd fly over), all underneath an altostratus deck that kept the Alaska range hidden from view.

Wasilla to Talkeetna, flight of two

The 5-minute hop over to Wasilla was uneventful aside from spotting numorous airstrips. Everyone and their uncle flies here, and being a well-populated area the land was littered with grass runways galore. One could take a quick look around from 1,500' AGL and probably count 20 unpaved runways within a few mile radius. The family I was meeting based their airplanes off of such a (shared) private strip. At Wasilla, we did a quick briefing to fly formation to Talkeetna; I'd be wing-man of course. The wind was gone within a few minutes of departing Wasilla and it was a surprisingly smooth flight. My host flew a good, solid, stable lead and it required very little effort to hold formation along the way.

Along the way my hosts were kind enough to get some nice air-to-air photos of me, and I managed to get a quick camera phone video in while at a safe distance.

Turbine DeHavilland Otter

Talkeetna is worth a stop on any Alaskan trip. Several air taxi services operate tour and other charter flights to circle around nearby Denali, the highest peak in North America. Many of the flights include glacier landings, a technique pioneered by bush pilot legend Don Sheldon. Some go to see the sights, others to start climbs. A couple friends of ours made attempts on Denali (one with a successful summit) several years ago, and launched each expedition to the mountain with a flight out of Talkeetna  All manner of bushplanes from Cessna 180s to Beavers and turbine-powered DeHavilland Otters were fitted with retractable skis for this purpose. The air tour activity, even on a cloudy day, runs nearly non-stop. Seeing a turbine Otter (think small school-bus on wings with a thousand-horsepower turbine on the front end) nearly levitate off the end of the runway was impressive every time.

DeHavilland Beaver

The town itself is all of a few square blocks, pretty all over, and while a tourist trap, was my kind of tourist trap: Few  kitchy wares for sale, but plenty of good food and, for those done wit their flying for the day, great beer that I'd get to try on my next visit (I decided right then and there to bring my wife back later).

My hosts treated me to a great Reindeer sausage sandwich for lunch before we walked back to the airport to go our separate ways.

On my own once again I looked over the Anchorage terminal chart and Alaska Flight Supplement to brief a flight into Merrill Field, one of Anchorage's airports. My wife was still 48 hours from arriving so I'd reserved a rental car and cheap place to stay for a couple of nights. I'd previously read that flying into the Anchorage area is akin to a bee returning to the swarm around a nest. Anchorage itself is a medium-sized city, but has a collection of airports smashed up against each other, from an air force base to a large international airport and worldwide cargo hub. Because of all this the airspace to get in and out of various airports is stratified.

One example of this is going into Merrill from the northwest as I was planning to do. I'd cross into town from the west over the Knik arm of the Cook Inlet. The special flight rules in the area specify that a pilot going into Merrill cross the arm, and then downtown, at either under 600', or above 2,000' -- fighter and heavy transport traffic to and from the air force base flies between.. and that was one little slice of airspace, among many in the area. En route, I was in an area with actual radar coverage for the first time since leaving Seattle, and got traffic advisories. No longer was the reply light on the transponder dark, as it had been for the last week of flying.

Once handed over to Merrill tower crossing the Knik arm, I finally saw why things were divvied up this way - the air force base was right next door. I was instructed to fly north of the field on downwind to land to the west, and made a pretty tight traffic pattern (even by my own standards) to do so. One thing I noticed flying almost every day for the past week was that my skills had ratcheted up considerably. I fly the Mooney, on average, once a week but this much time between man and machine tends to step things up a bit, and make the airplane an extension of the pilot. Being on one's "A" game to maneuver the airplane to a precise location, speed, and altitude were that much easier.

I landed in the rain, and even so it didn't take long for my appreciation of Merrill to develop. Here was an area, several city blocks' in size, completely littered with airplanes and related businesses over every square foot. General aviation is on a slow decline in the lower 48, here it is thriving, if out of nothing else than necessity. The airport was abuzz with Super Cubs launching for remote locales, Cessna 207s hauling cargo, and even King Airs with cargo pods on their bellies. One thing absent was a big fancy FBO (fixed base operator) ready to roll out the red carpet for a customer. Here it was all function over form. For a pilot, it was an exciting place to be.