The flight from Idaho Falls to Tacoma Washington looks pretty simple. About 460 miles with no really high terrain on the route. I wanted to go IFR so that I did not have to hassle with the Seattle class B airspace. This area is usually dry as a bone so I was less than happy when we had rain the night before departure and they were calling for more across the region.
While the route was easy, it was flanked by mountains in many places and this meant the IFR MEA (Minimum Enroute Altitude) would be 10,000. Ten Thousand was not a big deal, we had flown 12,500 to get to Idaho, the difference was the freezing level. It had the potential to be lower than the MEA. We have a Flight into Known Ice Baron but Mountains and the need to not sink below 10 thousand made this a potentially bad combination. We would not be launching into any known ice.
After having studied lots of weather, temperatures and such the days before, when we woke up, things were better than forecast. The only real weather in our path was at our destination, it was overcast but expected to clear. Either way it was not too low so we packed up and headed off. We were given a climb to 10,000 and on course and soon leveled off to a nice surprise. A tailwind Westbound. We had as much as 25 knots on the tail and as little as none but at least it wasn’t in our face. There was some weather out and about but it was off our path and the temperatures aloft were between 45 and 55 so ice was not an issue. We had mostly clear with an occasional wisps as we moved from Idaho to Oregon.
Reaching the Washington border we could clearly see Mt. Adams and Mt. Rainier. I had wanted to do a close flyby of Rainier but also wanted to be IFR. Usually these two don’t mix but I requested a course change to swing us by for a closer look. The controller was very accommodating and gave us a vector that put us less than 10 miles from the summit.
They have minimum altitudes on their scopes and it seemed like he gave us as close a show as possible. The downside of passing so close is that it leaves you only about 37 miles to lose 8,000 feet. The Baron excels at steep descents so down we went after passing Rainier. The air was smooth and the controller kept giving us lower as we zoomed down at 200+ knots. Oh and our destination, still 1300 overcast. Luckily I had briefed the approach and gotten set up before the sightseeing.
We took vectors to just outside the final approach fix where we joined the inbound course. Our speed was under control and below gear extension speed. Cleared for the approach it was gear down, flaps approach and then follow the instruments. We broke out at 1300’ above the field and made a nice touchdown. We were marshaled into Narrows Aviation and they had the car plane side before I could even get out.
After refueling and grabbing a snack, we headed off to sightsee. First stop was to look at the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. An earlier version had collapsed in 1940 when the wind blew. This version has done better. Fun fact, the collapsed bridge had a duplicate version that was installed to connect Deer Island in Maine. Once the Tacoma one fell, they fixed the design and CC and I drove over it in the mid 90’s. I believe it has since been replaced.
After the bridge, we dropped our stuff at the Marriott and then headed off to Point Defiance Park to enjoy a walk and some views. They had an amazing rose/flower garden. On the walk over we saw a deer just grazing in the park. It ignored the humans which was a bit surprising, they are more skittish back home. We ended up seeing several more.
After the flowers we visited a beach. Funny, it had no sand, just rocks and I think the water was pretty cold. We then took a hike to see some overlooks. After that we were pretty hungry so we headed out to a seafood spot we saw on the drive up. It was a market/restaurant and we split a basket. Tasty, yes, healthy, well maybe, they say fish is good for you. We capped the evening with a stroll around the hotel and walked across the famous Chihuly Bridge of Glass.
No comments:
Post a Comment