We bid a warm farewell to Smiley after brunch, but not before something magical happened: Julie, who’s been scared of small planes flew around the valley w/us! Such a treat for all of us. 🙂
So here’s a snap of Chelan airport, and the pix between will come later ‘cuz no wifi again tonite & posting by cellphone is tedious. Sleepy!
When we fly into a small town, people often think we’re rich. Then they ask where we’re from, and modestly replying Santa Barbara seals their mis-impression. So flying into Stanley was a nice change, because people there were somehow taking it all in stride. This morning we woke early and watched sunrise paint the Sawtooths behind our surprisingly cozy teepees.
3931 Smiley Dawn
Did you notice the three teepees in yesterday’s pic of our approach to Smiley Creek? You might also notice the two Harleys in this pic, belonging to the sweet couple from Utah who slept on the right with us in the middle and Julie at the left. After a wonderful breakfast of home made granola, the gals made the short drive to Stanley while I flew solo to meet them at the airport there. Being late morning, the air was still fairly cool and with all our camping gear in Julie’s car Tripp was light and frisky. So though there were enough thermals to make for a somewhat bouncy ride, I rode a big one up to 12,500′ for a better look at the mountains and Redfish Lake (Stanley’s in the distance beyond the end of the lake).
3994 Redfish Lake
Of even more interest to me were the zillions of alpine lakes like this, many clearly nestled where glaciers slumbered until a moment ago in geological time.
4016 High Lake
I like the colors amid the gray crags, and the traces of tough trees trying to stretch their march up the mountains. Several lakes had magnificent waterfalls like this next one.
4036 Cascading Lake
We drove together from Stanley out to Redfish Lake where we met Julie’s great friend Suzi, who later took a short scenic flight over the lake with me. Then as the ladies waited at big construction projects on the highway back to Smiley, I flew up the valley enjoying the scenery on both sides yet again on a different route in different light. Solo is fun, but I’m looking forward to sharing it all with Anne again tomorrow.
We woke early to watch the sunrise lighting the Sawtooth Mountains, and now I’m standing outside the lodge using their wifi and waiting for their 8am opening for some coffee to offset the 32F air out here. Meanwhile, here’s what I put together last night after discovering they have wireless.
We scored a cool teepee at the lodge across the little highway from the grass air strip. Their wifi means if we have any time off from hiking, flying, driving and all things camping… I’ll be able to sort and share some pix. This is such a great place for my first “soft field” landing!
0612 First Grass
Our dear Julie snapped this as we landed, and it was so wonderful to spot her standing there waiting for our arrival!
We flew near Crater Lake on the way here from Ashland,
3761 Crater Lake
passed the Three Sisters peaks approaching Bend,
3807 Three Sisters
saw miles of vicious rapids even closer to Bend,
3823 Kayak Challenge
(lots of kayaks, but we didn’t see any actually in the white water), and flew past Stanley along the Sawtooth Mountains that were clearly well-named.
3889 Sawtooth Sliver
The range is of course many miles long and this pic is just a small slice near Stanley, but it gives you an idea of how jagged the peaks are. The many alpine lakes are stunning, but smoke from fires near Boise added to the natural haze backlit by the lowering sun so I’ll just have to fly them again to try for some better pix. 🙂
Quick post tonite because we’ve been up late talking with our friend in Ashland. Just had to post even tho there’s no wifi here (using my Droid cellphone instead), because today was so breathtaking. Here are a few snaps of the unbelievable routing we got past San Francisco, and of the Mt. Shasta summit we flew close to because winds were light. Needless to say, we have many more great pix from today to share with you later. 🙂
3301 San Francisco!
Now that we’re home from the Smiley Adventure, I’m updating some posts to make corrections and as you can see in this one: post better versions of the pix!
3323 Coit Up Close
3610 Shasta Summit
John & Anne Wiley 
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