Route of flight:
We were wading through gear shin deep across the floor when my mom walked in. “I thought you finished packing yesterday.” My dad followed her up the stairs carrying their luggage. They were moving in to take care of Rachel while we flew ourselves to Alaska, but as noted, we had yet to move out. Mark managed to keep his cool, despite having just badly injured a critical piece of gear. He took off to the shop for a quick repair while I took my parents with me to drop Rachel off at day care.
The house had been in a state of increasing chaos for days. Lists littered the fridge: camping gear, survival gear, bear protection, mosquito protection, food, emergency contacts for my parents, care and feeding instructions for Rachel, and the cat - don’t forget the cat. The cat definitely knew that we were leaving town - he’d been through this before - but little Rachel hadn’t a clue. She didn’t really get that something big was going down until I dropped her off at daycare and said goodbye. Boy, was she in for a surprise.
I met Mark back at the house to pack up and head to the hangar. We were running behind on our departure time, so we made a quick call to Canadian customs on our way to the airport to let them know what time we’d be getting in. Then we notified US Homeland Security that we would be leaving the country (it’s a ridiculous requirement for private pilots - don’t get me started). Then we quickly packed the plane mindful of weight and balance, scribbled out a last will and testament and left it on the dash in the car - just in case. An hour later we were finally airborne. We activated our flight plan, keyed in our transponder code and turned north.
We flew through scattered showers over Puget Sound, light filtered through the clouds highlighting the islands in the San Juans. It was beautiful, but we’d seen it before. At the start of our trip with three weeks of bush flying adventure ahead of us it was hard to take the time to appreciate the beauty of our own back yard. Besides, we were cramming to prepare for flying in Canadian airspace where the rules are similar to the US but just different enough to throw us off our game.
It was an hour flight to the Abbotsford aerodrome where we cleared customs and fueled. We also got a weather briefing and filed our flight plan with Canadian Flight Services along with a detailed description of our plane and the survival equipment aboard which they like to know just in case we don’t actually arrive at our destination. For this flight that would be Prince George and to get there we’d be following the Fraser River east from Abbotsford and north at Hope, BC.
We were in luck this afternoon, the morning had cleared and there was very little wind along the route. The Fraser River was high through the valley, overflowing the banks into farmland in some places. As we followed it into the Cascade Range the mountains tightened around us. At the town of Hope the river makes a 90 degree turn to the north and we turned with it into ever steepening terrain, the river cutting a narrow canyon below us.
For once there was a slight tailwind and no turbulence in the canyon. We’ve had flights through here before with winds out of the west rotoring over the tops of the mountains and churning up the air in the canyon to rival the turbulence of the rushing river below. Real headbangers. Not today though. It was a smooth ride as we cruised at around 5000ft following the river north into the plains.
The farther north we went, the fewer signs of people we saw. Towns spread out along the river but didn’t penetrate far into the forests to the east or west. North of the turnoff to Kamloops the mountains flattened out into broad forested terrain. Lots of logging, and a fair amount of mining in these parts.
After fueling in Prince George and taking a good look at the weather ahead, we decided to fly one more leg and head to Smithers for the night. As evening wore on, the puffy clouds that had built up over the day began to let loose rain showers. We dodged around a few cells and eventually found Smithers in a small valley tucked in between mountains on either side of the Bulkley River. It was late as we landed and after a long walk to town we managed to find the local brewpub and get our orders in just before the kitchen closed.
It seemed like it had taken forever to get out of town but we'd made good miles and it felt like our adventure was just beginning.
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