Following a link from the SC site, I stumbled on www.pacificnorthwestflying.com and his archive of lost airports. It was really interesting. One in particular caught my eye. This was the Grisdale strip just North of Aberdeen on the Wynoochee River. This strip is still visable and there's a better than average chance of salvaging it. I have hunted this area and know roughly where the gravel dump is but don't recall the strip itself. 'Course I really wasn't looking either. I also don't know who owns it... it having been a company town and all. Our fall weather is getting icky and I might take a trip (driving, ugh) out there and survey the site. This is a good fishing river with a lot of game too. It would be pretty neat to have a strip there again. If for no other reason than as a "safety" strip. There is nothing in this area except logging roads if a guy were to have trouble. What made this strip different from the others is that almost all had been encroached upon by development. This one was simply abbandoned as was the town. As I recall, there are a few buildings out there but in bad shape. I will report on what I find out there.

Ah, the dreaded annual. Not to worry. I am of the opion that if flown regularly, the repair aspect is minimized.
If I get the chance to go out there, I will take pictures and survey whether this possible. I will also get some coordinates to share. If anyone is out there look around. It is just south of the Oxbow. I have also been using Google earth to look around. Pretty cool.

Snap an aerial pic, Kurt.

Kurt, the Seattle sectional shows a private strip, "Wishkah River", about 8 miles north of Aberdeen on the Wishkah (one drainage west of the Wynoochie). There's a little bunch of farms along this river, I've eyeballed them on the way by going to Copalis or Hoquiam but haven't ever been sure I had the airstrip spotted. You know, one pasture looks just like the next without a windsock airplane or obvious hangar to identify it.
I'll have to remember to eyeball the Wynoochie drainage next time. You said there had been a company town- was it a Weyerhauser or other logging/timber/mill operation?

Eric

I logged (helicopter) up there in the Wynoochee Valley for Simpson when they had Camp Grisdale. That was back in '81 through 84'. The strip was in bad shape then and somebody was starting to use it as a dump. Unless someone has gone in and rehabilitated it I'm sure it is overgrown and gone. Camp Grisdale was a full blown old-time logging camp with a school, bunkhouses, a store and about thirty small houses for their employees. In '84 Simpson was in the process of turning their lease back to the Forest Service. As I understand it they had to remove all traces of the camp and town. I have always wanted to go see what it looks like now. As far as flying there I always thought it would be easier to land on the road up by the lake. (Probably illegal.)

That's why the term "precautionary landing" came to be!
Went to Grisdale today to find the fabled strip. It was a good excuse to take the 10yo boy out for his first grouse hunt with his new .22 and get the Lab back up to speed. One bird and spotted a couple of Elk. No mushrooms and plenty of rain. Found the strip, er where it used to be anyway. Kenny's right. They've been filling and dumping for some time. I got a couple of pics but I have to get around to downloading them. Even Bush Wheels can't help here, sorry Wup! This strip's done. I'll still get some arials though Zane.
This chasing down old strips is kind of fun though. I think I'm going to put together a hit list. Any takers?
Kenny, found the old sites. Plenty of foundations, a 50's Studabaker truck and the old rail tracks. Found some of the infrastructure from the earlier camp and rail line too. That was pretty cool. Also a large skid of logs that seemed to have been used for a donkey engine. Huge logs but that would have been pretty old to still be recognizable.
I'll figure out the next target and let all know.

I think it is kind of a cool concept-- airstrip reseurrection. Probably a lot of history surrounding them too, like the logging camp one. Of course the legality is always a concern, but if it's remote enough, who cares.

If you have not found it yet check out Dave Herman's excelent web site of lost Washington airports.

http://www.lostairports.com/

He's been working on this a long time.

Tom Unger

That is a great site Tom, I am going to link to it on the BCP homepage.

Z

Anyone know what happened to lostairports.com ? Seems to be offline.