Home Page.  For more information email us at info@precisionwindsports.com.
 

Taking off from Kelso, Washington airport, 17 feet above sea level, and climbing quickly, we followed a ridge line east to Mount St. Helens.  It was too cold to fly over the crater, but the view from the north where the crater opened up was stunning.

Thirty miles to the north we could see the summit of Mt. Rainier.  From our lofty trike perches, the boys could see Rainier's summit better than we ever seen it when Beth and I were stationed at Ft. Lewis, Washington 20 years before.  We also saw peaks in the Northern Cascades -- Mt. Adams, Mt. Hood, and Mt. Jefferson -- more than 80 miles away.  It was spectacular!  Fortunately, our flight to Mount St. Helens was the week before the area was closed because of new volcanic activity.  Indeed, the growing lava dome was visible during our flight.

From Washington, we headed south stopping at Crater Lake, Oregon, and then moved on to California's northern coast near Crescent City.  The weather was gorgeous, and we drooled over the prospect of exploring the rocky coastline by air the next day.  After our usual airport reconnaissance, I decided to fly for the last few minutes before sunset.  The evening coastal flight was beautiful.  Unfortunately, the fog rolled in overnight and remained an obstacle for the rest of the week.  If you plan on doing any coastal flying, remember fog can be challenging to work around; even just a mile away, the weather can be great.

From Crescent City, we moved inland to Redding, California.  Our goal was to tour the Whiskeytown-Shasta Trinity National Recreation Area.  These lakes are real beauties and a mecca for water-related activities, including above-water flying.  We spent hours exploring the meandering shorelines and popping over high ridges.

From Redding, we headed for Yosemite National Park and the Mojave Desert and then made our way to Utah and the Colorado Plateau, also know as the Grand Circle.  This area is home to more national parks than anywhere else in the country, including the Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce Canyon, Lake Powell/Glen Canyon, and Monument Valley national parks.  Based on our research, our anticipation for some spectacular flying was high.

We started our visit at Zion National Park and then moved to Bryce Canyon where the airport is at 7,600 feet MSL.  Because conditions there are usually windy, our flying was restricted to the first few hours after sunrise.  This was the highest airport we had flown from, with a density altitude of 9,100 feet.  Thanks to the added power of our 80-hp Rotax 912 engines, we needed only a tiny fraction of the airport's 7,400 foot long runway, and we were able to climb to 12,000 feet to explore higher vistas.  Few GA aircraft can equal a trike's high density altitude performance. (Our weight-to-thrust ration is 4-to-3; not many fixed-wing airplanes have those impressive numbers.)

Previous Page -- Photo Album -- Next page

Advertisers:

FOR SERIOUS RECREATION

Send mail to terri@precisionwindsports.com with questions or comments about this web site.
Last modified: 01/01/09