I am planning on getting my floatplane rating next year and would love to do the training in Alaska, get some mountain flying training and backcountry experience at the same time.

This place looked pretty good in terms of hitting everything I am looking for:
Alaska Float Ratings
http://www.alaskafloatratings.com
.. and the area looks amazing on Google Earth.

Anybody with any experience with those guys?

Any info welcomed!

flyboyinca wrote:I am planning on getting my floatplane rating next year and would love to do the training in Alaska, get some mountain flying training and backcountry experience at the same time.

This place looked pretty good in terms of hitting everything I am looking for:
Alaska Float Ratings
http://www.alaskafloatratings.com
.. and the area looks amazing on Google Earth.

Anybody with any experience with those guys?

Any info welcomed!

I obtained my float rating with Vern & Lura @ Moose Pass in 1998. I don't have one bad thing to say about the course. Good equipment, good instruction, great environment, thorough and practical knowledge taught by experienced instructors in a real world, mountainous, backcountry environment. Found myself, comfortably, confidently and capably flying a Super Cub on floats in the same area the following summer. Worth every penny.

I got my float rating with them also. Vern is a very experienced pilot. He is also really opinionated. I had lots of fun, and felt like he did everything he could to make me a competent and safe float pilot.

Now, wait.....VERN----Opinionated??????



MTV

mtv wrote:Now, wait.....VERN----Opinionated??????



MTV

Unlike most pilots...

I took one lesson at AlaskaFloatRatings (see our friends comments about Vern's personality), then ended up in Talkeetna with Don Lee http://www.alaskafloats.com/
i highly recommend Don Lee and his operation
His Guest Lodge is impeccable (WiFi), loaner of car to go to Talkeetna.
You could also get tailwheel endorsement there
i just did the seaplane in June 2008

Don Lee is a personal friend of mine and probably one of the better true bush pilots in Alaska. He used to fly for my uncle at Royal Wolf Lodge in Katmai years ago. To say I have learned from him is an understatment. His school is fantastic and offers tremendous opportunities to learn something. Not to mention you staring at Denali all day if the weather is good.

The Kenai Penn is great as well and they have an excellent school, but its sort of like combat fishing on the Kenai. Lots of people, traffic etc. Go North and see Don.

He is the man!

mtv wrote:Now, wait.....VERN----Opinionated??????



MTV

Shocking I know! He is very persuasive as well in his arguments.
Moose Pass is so beautiful. Pictures do not do it justice.

I just finished up with Don at AK Float and Skis for ASES. While I think it was top notch, and Ether was very pleasing on the eyes, the organization there was poor.

Don would set schedules, then they would change to fit whomever was in front of him at the time. I had paid, and arranged my schedule months in advance, and we were on Alaska time once I arrived..

Since my employer is much like that I knew what I had to do to be sucessfull. I stayed in his peripheral vision the entire 3 days.

That being said, I would love to go back. I would contact him and find a time that doesn't have a lot of people there and you could fly the wings off that stubby piper.

Don mucked up his knee digging a canoe out of the brush while I was on my checkride, so I wish him well.

I did have a great time, and knowing what I know now would make the next trip more enjoyable.

Oh and I got to drive Don Sheldons old pickup with AFS has. Hadn't been registered since 1994, but no one seemd to care....

Cervelorod wrote: and we were on Alaska time once I arrived..

....

we prefer to call it talkeetna time... which includes the time from a few minutes late, up to and including a few days late. it's the way things run up here.

don has his hands full in the summer months, and does a pretty good job considering...

Unfortunately I have the time right now to get my float rating and the water is a bit hard here in Alaska so I'm off to Florida to get mine with Florida Seaplanes.
But I have had the experience to fly with Vern out of Moose Pass. He flew a buddy and I out on a Goat hunt and I was actually amazed when he arrived to pick us up Ceiling was LOW but it was broken and he came scud running the bay(we thought it was a boat coming!), shoved us in the plane and we got outta there before the hole closed up on him. A great experience. I wish I could get my rating from them, but summers are so hectic here I can never seem to get away during the summer.......than there's hunting season.......than it's frozen.
Never met Don in Talkeetna so can't give an opinion either way there.

Flyboy, one of my fellow CFIs at our club did his ASES at Alaska Float Plane Ratings and he said it was the most fun he has ever had in a plane. Now, I have to agree that floatplanes are fun to fly, but the thing that got me is, this is coming from a Navy Hornet pilot that is a Top Gun grad.

Chickenair, I did my seaplane rating through Florida Seaplanes. Rich Hensch is a retired Navy pilot and a ton of fun to fly with. You are going to love landing on the St. Johns River. Rich knows some great places to dock for lunch too. Get ready to have a blast.

bmurrish:
Well I got the float rating done with Rich and your right, we had a blast! The river landings were my favorite. The lakes are so big you can't miss. The river makes you concentrate alot more.
Great experience and great equipment. I'm retired Navy also so Rich and I got along just fine.

Haha! I knew you would have a great time. Rich is so laid back he fits right into the Jimmy Buffett kind of mind set. Awesome instructor with awesome seaplanes. Hope you got to see what he calls incentive to make good landings (gators). Congrats on your new rating, Seaplane Pilot!!!

Bill

I got my private SES with Vern. I thought it was a top notch school. I only got to fly with Vern though the last day. I wish I could have flown with him more because he showed me a few tricks in the Super Cub. Moose Pass is tight in the mountains so if you aren't comfortable flying in tight passes you will be there.

I have also been to Jack Browns with a buddy. The instruction was quick and dirty. It is very fast passed. You are flying in flat Florida, below 500 ft AGL in a J3 that you won't preflight or start yourself. I guess you get what you pay for.

I was told to just go get the rating somewhere cheap and when you come back (the companies chief pilot) will teach you how to fly. I went to Vern instead because he has flown in AK enough to earn the right to voice his opinions.

I got my SES from Jack Brown in 1974. I went oto Moose Pass in 2000 for a "refresher" with Vern. Wow. What fun. Vern knows his stuff, is outspken and has a strong personality. If you don't have those attributes he may intimidate you. But if you "get over it" and pay attention you'll come away being good and confident.

don't know anything about them...just another option


http://www.floatplanealaska.com/

No personal experience, but have heard good things from many people on supercub.org. I believe he might post here as well.

Alex Clark in Homer Alaska


http://www.acsalaska.net/~aclark/