Another flying diversion

Last week was a total bust for me mostly due to being sick all week.  I think I get to blame my grandson for the cold I caught and the associated sinus infection.

Saturday however was one of those phenomenal clear sky, million-mile visibility days with low wind speeds.  I decided that if I had to hire someone to fly me, I was going to take to the skies.

Fortunately, a good buddy of mine has a 1948 NAvion L-17-B and had a shout out to anyone wanting to ride along.  Sold!  My poor little super cub will have to stay in the hanger a little longer until my head is more clear I am afraid.

We left our home field (Harvey Field -  S43) in Snohomish, WA and flew to the Olympic Penninsula and cruised the length of Hood Canal stopping for lunch at Shelton (KSHN) at the cafe in the parachute jump centre.

Hood canal runs against the east side of the Olympic Mountains, which I think are particularly beautiful.

After a nice lunch, we decided to head on out to the Pacific Ocean coast and head north.  We flew the length of the Washington coast from about Pacific Beach all the way to Neah Bay.

The wind was a bit brisk onshore as evidenced by the breakers on the shallow beach.

We had to circle a few islands off the coast.  Pretty rugged coastline with very few options for an emergency landing.

Here we are rounding the bend around Tatoosh Island off Cape Flattery.  This is the most north-western point of the United States.  I am actually surprised that any of these pictures turned out because as we made this turn, we were just getting slammed around by the wind.  Thousands of miles of Pacific Ocean winds from Canada and the Washington coast converging and trying to stuff through the Straits of Juan de Fuca.  We picked up a lot of ground speed as we turned east down the Straits.

Looking back south down the Pacific Coast.  Sun is dropping towards the horizon.

Crossing Puget Sound from the West, Mt. Rainier in the distance about 10 miles from Harvey Field.  On days like this, there is no finer place to fly than the Pacific Northwest.

If you would like to see all of my pictures of the trip, here is a link.  About three hours of flying and endless beauty.