Labour Day – Flying for Pie and Pemberton
by Eleanor Eastick
from The Patrician Newsletter http://www.flyvfc.com/database/2012October.pdf
September 3rd this year was the best flyout in a decade!
The weather was darn near perfect and the temperatures in the 20s – does it get any better? For sure, there was some of that pesky low marine cloud over the strait, but that was easy to go over or under. The mainland and all the mountains pread out in glo-ry in a slight heat haze as the Victoria flyout squadron headed for a pie and coffee break at Chilliwack before turning northwards over Harrison Lake and through the mountain passes over Lillooet Lake to Pemberton. The runway at CYPS is sandwiched between the Green and Lillooet Rivers. The lake is a most unusual milky green in sunlight becoming jade green in shadow ow-ing to the feeder rivers carrying soft sediment from glacial movement in the mountains.
For history buffs, these lakes and rivers were once part of the Douglas Road carrying men to the
Caribou during the gold rush, before the completion of the wagon road in 1865. The route from the coast began at Howe Sound and followed waterways past Whistler into the Pemberton Valley. Paddlewheel steamers plied Lillooet Lake. (I wrote a book about this – don’t ask!)
We flew the course of the 1860’s trail (Harrison Lake north then west to Howe Sound) in less than two hours, a hard journey of many weeks so long ago – and not nearly as much fun! The Pemberton Valley is truly beautiful, wide, flat and only 670’ ASL. It is home to several golf clubs and the airport itself is a busy glider and parachute base. A hint of wind favoured runway 24 when the nine plane flyout arrived. The temperature was an ac-ceptable 30C as the 25 happy participants made their way to the southwest end of the airport and through a gate to one of the golf clubs for refreshments.
The restaurant has a large roofed patio over-looking the airport and that is where we all settled after
pushing several tables together to remain in a group. There we sat, hangar-flying and chatting until we made our way back to the ramp to prepare for the flight home, although YYJ was not everyone’s home airport.
A picture perfect pilot and passenger day!
Check the photos on the next page or visit our Face-book page for the full album!
www.facebook.com/VictoriaFlyingClub
