Finally had a nice evening yesterday to fly around with Mrs Burns and do some sightseeing.

I think this is one of the prettier drainages near us.


Looking towards the high peaks.


This is the Goodnow River flowing into the Hudson roughly 20 miles from it's headwaters.



The hamlet of North River, about 20 miles south of the previous photo. We own the house in the lower right of the photo. It's the house my mom grew up in. We live in the house my dad grew up in. Different houses even though it's a "tight knit" community here... The next town upstream is 30 miles.


Barton Mines. A Garnet mine. The largest private employer in town. Their processing plant is the top building in the previous photo.


North Creek. About 5 more miles downstream. Where our strip is. You can just make out some of the hangers and part of the runway in the back of the photo.


A couple of the neighbors.


Pete

Breezy Point, May 2 2026

Mojave Desert is still nice. Gonna get hot real soon.

Just a comment on the plane landing next to a hovering helicopter. Don't do it. My pals cub was a total loss and lucky for him he survived.

Coyote wrote:Just a comment on the plane landing next to a hovering helicopter. Don't do it. My pals cub was a total loss and lucky for him he survived.

My exact thoughts when I saw that pic.
Lots of downwash from a hovering helo-- even a small one.

hotrod180 wrote:

Coyote wrote:Just a comment on the plane landing next to a hovering helicopter. Don't do it. My pals cub was a total loss and lucky for him he survived.

My exact thoughts when I saw that pic.
Lots of downwash from a hovering helo-- even a small one.

This is the result at our airport a few years ago. He survived.


https://youtu.be/tZLXMKMgnS8

skyward II wrote:This is the result at our airport a few years ago. He survived.
https://youtu.be/tZLXMKMgnS8

I remember seeing that video a while back,
it immediately came to mind when I saw BRD's photo.

Flew to NH for our anniversary and a couple of R&R days before our season gets crazy. Took a nice flight up the coast from Hampton to the Biddeford area and back Fri morning.

Ogunquit Beach


Inlet to Wells Harbor


Wood island lighthouse




A couple of random shots.



First time flying on any coast for me. I think there should be more in the future.

Pete

It's not always sunshine, fair winds and sailing ships out on the water. I knew this rain was coming, but it arrived much sooner than expected. It was relatively clear when I departed, but pretty rough when I returned to home base. The winds were really squirrely on final, but the plane is reusable, so all's well. You can make out the airport on the right edge of the picture. It's about 3.5 miles out, so I'm still VFR, but it isn't pretty.

It seems that this is one of the most, if not the most, popular threads here on BCP with nearly 1,000,000 views. I think we should just try to push it into the next order of magnitude. Will it crash the server? Or perhaps a nothing event like Y2K?

Here is one from a couple of days ago. Took my friend clamming on his birthday.

While we are at it, here is one from the day before. Chasing bears on the beach.

Those are great. Fun as hell digging clams from your plane I have to think. Two questions, how do you determine if the mud flat is firm enough and I am guessing if something goes south you would be at the mercy of the tides?

Pete

The surface of the mud flats at that particular clamming area has been well vetted over the years. But, in unknown areas, you can apply one of the important rules of backcountry flying or backcountry skiing and let someone else go first. There are other guiding principles on working beaches and tidal areas that are well described in the BCP archives.

People most often worry about not being able to start their engine when in a tidal zone because, yes, if you are not able to fly off the beach or the flats, you will be at the mercy of the tides. Risk is ever-present in much of what we do in aviation. In my 40 years of flying, I have only had my engine fail to start once. I'm glad it didn't happen on the beach.

Took a friend from Idaho to some west coast beaches

I'm not necessarily a backcountry pilot but more for the lack of funding than the lack of trying.

I'm based in the SLC area and was invited to a wedding up in AK. I reached out to a good friend and former employee of pburns who lived local and he graciously invited me to stay in his home and drive his vehicle even though he would be out of town. Since I already made the trek for the wedding and had a free place to stay I figured I would do some flight training while in town. It is Alaska, afterall.

Monday I started my tailwheel endorsement in Blue River Aviation's 85hp Champ 7BCM. We did an hour of ground, some stalls, dutch rolls, and steep turns, and finally 3 takeoffs and landings.

Tuesday we got more into it, logging 27 landings of the 3 point variety both on the hard surfaced runway and eventually moving to the parallel gravel strip.

Weds and Thurs I spent time with my ladyfriend and a childhood best friend exploring the area while the CFI took a his weekend. Early this morning I dropped them off at the International and I'll be staying for another 9 days to explore this vast playground and further my training.

Today we got back to it and started the session with exploring the Knik Glacier and Lake George region.
Following that we moved onto wheeled landings, logging another 17 landings.

We're taking tomorrow off and hopefully I'll get signed off for the TW endorsement Sunday after one-wheeled landings. Then the fun begins of exploring the backcountry and mountain strips in the region.

Snapped a shot of a Beaver on floats enjoying the lake


Looking up the glacier above Inner Lake George


Really enjoyed the textures of the ice


Hopefully more to come in the next week.

That's great! Who did you stay with? Initials are fine. J.S. Or J.W. By chance?

Pete

JS. He drove down to Bend, OR to pick up a truck topper last month when we were in town visiting my lady's family. Got to spend a few days riding mtb with them before they took off to Driggs, now they're somewhere around Fernie creeping their way back North. Seems like I might miss them by a couple days or weeks depending on how much fun they're having.

Yesterday got derailed a bit as my CFI had some issues with the Citabria he was ferrying back before our flight. Not to mention winds were 17g24 with a stout crosswind component. We pushed the lesson later to ground only and he treated me to dinner at the Palmer Alehouse for the inconvenience. Absolute homie move.

Today we did some standard pattern work with both three points and wheelies, adding one wheel landings into the mix. He had me do a pavement three point, pavement wheelie, pavement one wheel, and gravel spot 3 point landing unassisted. We went back to the hangar for a quick break where he signed me off for the tailwheel endorsement and we got into more fun - baby's first true off airport landing.

We headed Southeast to the Practice strip on the Kink and did a few inspection passes before committing to a landing. We got out, walked around a bit, inspected the strip from the ground, and headed back to PAAQ to call it a day.

3-4 more days of flying in the mecca until I head back to SLC. Hopefully plenty more to experience between now and then. Time to pay off my credit card so I stop getting warnings about reaching my account limit

No fun photos today.
Palmer - Goose Bay - Willow - Big Lake - Back to Palmer. 2.6 hours 16 landings.

Headed back to the Knik tomorrow to get some more work on Practice strip and then moving back to some of the shorter, more difficult ones.

Congrats on the tailwheel sign off! Great pics. Enjoy the rest of your time there.

Pete