Hello Gordon! We told you we’d put you on our Blog yesterday, but we didn’t get any internet access where we stayed, so couldn’t post anything. I know you said you don’t get online often, so I’m hoping you’ll still see this one and let us know by commenting (and let me know if I spelled your last name right). We enjoyed your friendly helpful manner and felt you represented “Unity” very well.
0099 Gordon McClane & J in Unity
and thanks for taking our pic 🙂
0101 J&A in Unity
We almost reached our goal of Smithers today, but a wall of storms rose to meet us at Burns Lake so we’re settling for the night. Here’s our track West so far:
Track West to Burns Lk
This has been quite a day, and it seems impossible we woke yesterday in Regina! We slept in the deserted Jasper Hinton airport with permission, and woke early. Since the mountain pass entry into the Jasper park had patches of low cloud beneath a high solid overcast, we rode into town for a delightful breakfast with Pete & Nadine. Not only do we share a love of adventure and flying, but we talked psychology with former therapist Nadine. After a fruitless search of Hinton for the “archetypal cafe” where locals go, we relented and chose Smitty’s (Canadian equivalent of Denny’s) where it turned out there were lots of locals mingling with a biker group that stopped in. Despite the forgettable food, the company was fabulous. Our next stop was a supermarket where the gals got supplies while the guys tapped into an open wifi hotspot and my main focus was online weather info. Back at the airport I filed the daily flight plan and got a weather brief to supplement what I’d seen online and was about to experience first hand.
0198 Climber's Challenge
Minutes after our fond farewell, we became Jasper gaspers. The sheer enormity of the features is truly astounding. I didn’t get many good pix due to the lingering clouds and the smoke from myriad regional wildfires, but I hope you can get some sense of how amazing this place is. I’d been through on the train once, but flying it is orders of magnitude more astounding. Having only heard about it, poor Anne was even more unprepared.
0204 Bird's Eye
At the edge of the village the road near a small pond framed a perfect blue bird’s eye.
0221 Unseen Falls
High up the steep slope is a raging waterfall that few other than aviators ever see.
Anne’s blogging right now so I’ll close by briefly describing our passage to Burns Lake. We decided to stay high across Prince George and stop at Fraser Lake. Then we noted that the GPS said nothing about fuel or other services there, so we diverted toward Vanderhoot. Descending to land, another pilot kindly informed us that though there was plenty of fuel the only two people who could pump it for us were not available for at least four hours.
Now my personal choice is to always have at least an hour of reserve fuel. Climbing back on course I calculated 90 minutes’ fuel remaining. While that could have carried us beyond our goal of Smithers, it wouldn’t work for me. I asked our friendly local pilot about Burns Lake and he assured us it has services including fuel. It left me right at the edge of my hour reserve and there were plenty of alternatives within half an hour, so we pressed on. Now we started noticing rain showers ahead. Dodging between those while constantly checking and triple-checking fuel burn against time and distance remaining (and reassured by cross-check with my recently fine-calibrated fuel gauges) we hugged closer to the road and at last made it into Burns Lake. With exactly an hour of fuel remaining. After looking at the sky and the internet, talking to the Flight Service weather briefer, and looking at each others’ haggard faces, we decided to accept the kind hospitality of the airport angels here. We’re snug in a borrowed room, typing away as our eyelids droop ever lower ahead of the 9pm sunset. So all this by way of context on how tired we’re feeling right now. Happy tired. 😉
Every day is different, every day divine. Yesterday there was something special about the way sky reflected in water.
0141 Bird's Eye
Many times a small pond next to a farm house would shimmer with sky as we passed, creating a powerful illusion of the portal of pond revealing another world beyond. Though I saw that effect many times, it was so mesmerizing and fleeting there are no better photos. Even video could probably only capture a hint of it anyway I guess. So much of what we experience flying is impossible to capture or even describe.
0143 Lost Home
An old abandoned farm house on the Saskatchewan prairie miles from any other structure seems to whisper stories of struggling families and improvised repairs.
What would explain these circles? Was there something in the center of each that attracted milling cattle? Were they deliberately carved by a tractor for some reason?
0146 Evidence Of?
Approaching Edmonton we noticed what seem to be massive parks and green areas along the river.
0163 Approaching Edmonton
With all the fires in Western Canada, the air is very smoky in places but the views are still spectacular.
0168 Window On Edmonton
As we descended to land at the downtown airport, our small room provided a grand view of the skyline. We heard that there had just been a car race on one of the runways, and the viewing stands were still there. We also heard that some in the city would like to close this airport. The property must be very tempting to developers, but it would sure be a big loss.
After a brief stop we flew on to Hinton, just outside Jasper, where we stopped for a night of “camping” inside the empty terminal building. Maybe Anne will post some photos, because I didn’t get any here. We met Pete and Nadine, who have explored in their own plane and are now exploring with a small camper and bikes. Thus ended another day of discoveries and delights. Today we hope to make it through the pass to Smithers, though weather may bring other plans.
Having lived in Canada for a time, some names have a far off and romantic association for me. Winnipeg is among those. We met some great people and had some great fun walking here. Leaving later than hoped from tBay (too much fun there too, including some time chatting with newlyweds whose honeymoon was flying a 2-seat C-150 across Canada), we dodged some dodgy weather. Getting to Fort Frances on our first leg we got down to 1200 AGL in light rain following the highway for a time. I thought it would be cool to see International Falls just across the river. We did, and it wasn’t (cool that is).
0084 Dam Falls
Very industrial, and it seems any falls were made into a dam long ago. Wonder what it was like before. On the Canadian side where we landed to avoid customs mania, Tom at the airport was exceptionally helpful and friendly. From there up to Kenora was easier, so rather than stop we turned West to Winnipeg. So many fascinating Ontario wetlands and Manitoba farms along the way.
0092 Manitoba Farm
The city itself is interesting from the air too, with what Anne calls a “cobbled” skyline. There’s a bridge downtown that people seem especially proud of. That’s it on the left with the white web of suspension cables. Looks like some great waterfront parks in the area around the stadium.
0108 Winnipeg
So having been out late tonight, an early start tomorrow is unlikely. We’ll probably just make the relatively short and easy (if weather cooperates) hop to Regina tomorrow, then Calgary and up to Edmonton. We’ll see how it goes, as always on our flexible adventures. 🙂
Big Brother and Cousin Corpo slowed our progress today. First came all the hoops of CBP’s new and improved eAPIS reporting system for planes flying across U.S. borders. In the old days they were interested only in people and things entering the country, but now they are intrigued by departures as well. If larger than a Canada goose flying across, you must answer lots of questions and carry documents. Once out of the land of the free you must deal with an entirely different Canadian Customs than 2007 or so when we simply taxied our plane into a box painted on the tarmac, picked up a phone to assure them we had no weapons or other stuff they didn’t like, and we were free to fly on. Today we waited two hours while two armed men drove the five miles or so from Soo Canada to that airport. We had failed to phone giving two hours’ notice of our intention to invade this beautiful land. Now we know, so hopefully next time the CanPass system they told us about will ease our transition North. Once they’d done their work we enjoyed a few minutes of easy conversation and laughter as people rather than the roles we humans so often become entangled in. At least the roles and procedures help us all feel safer, right? 😉
While waiting we tried to activate Anne’s phone for use in Canada. Verizon it seems has special torments for anyone taking phones into Canada. To get it working we were to dial a number on the phone, but of course the phone didn’t work. Mine somehow did, so it’s activated. Now I have the right to pay the better part of a dollar per minute of talk time. As an added bonus, the new Android phone I bought for the trip is equipped with a data connection that racks up charges even when not in use. I think that great feature is now turned off. Too bad that neither the data connection nor the phone voice connections work reliably. 🙂
Happily, we did finally take off to see how far we could fly around the top of Lake Superior toward Thunder Bay. The scattered clouds were too low for us to fly high and thus shortcut more of the highway’s curves to save time, so we kept within 5-10 miles most of the way. A nice benefit of flying low of course is the intimate perspective on our green planet. There were many small lakes in variety of shapes and hues, like this little gem surrounded by miles of forest.
0046 Small Lake
The first airport along the Trans-Canada highway from Soo is in the small town of Wawa. Do you love that name too? At the edge of Lake Superior a couple of miles from town was a scene so placid as to be ethereal.
0061 Quiet Waters
I just love the curve of the ripples in the lagoon. Be sure to click and see the largest version of this one. I’ll probably post larger versions of some snaps from this flight on my Photo Page too.
Rounding the tip of Superior just offshore is a cluster of small islets descending gracefully into the clear water.
0075 Floating Islands
At last we turned away from the moderate headwinds and sped toward Thunder Bay, where a long row of bluffs reflects the lowering sun.
0082 Approaching T. Bay
It wasn’t getting dark as this photo seems to show. Thick clouds were blocking most of the sun, and much of the remaining light surrendered to fairly thick smoke from fires further North. T’Bay is off to the right of this photo, in the distance. Thus ends another glorious day on our North by Northwest adventure. We bid you pleasant dreams and happiness in your homes as we wander the continent.
John & Anne Wiley 
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