July 3rd 2004 Lake Hood Float Planes

The weather still sucks to the north so I am just staying near Anchorage today. I was interested in checking out the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum so I headed toward the airport and the Lake Hood Sea Plane Base. This area is an absolutely amazing place for an aviation buff such as my self to spend time at. Here there are thousands of small airplanes operating right next to the big international airport. and at times you could see small float planes taking off right net to commercial 747's. I drove around Lake Hood and the general aviation field trying to comprehend all the different types of planes crammed in to this area. The roads even doubled as taxiways! I made my way to the museum and spent a couple of hours admiring all the vintage planes they had in their collection. Then I wandered around the lake some more and finally settled on a nice spot to watch the float planes taking off and landing. The air traffic patterns were the most complex and unorthodox I have ever seen but they seemed to have a handle on the traffic. While I was watching the planes come and go I also put some of the early web pages about this trip together and up loaded them to my site.

In the evening I had planed to catch the Bore tide come up the inlet but I lost track of time and missed it, A bore tide is when there is a large difference in the out going tide and the incoming. The large slug of out going water ends up being pushed back in tot he sound by the more massive incoming tide and it creates a wave 3-6 feet high that sweeps all the way up the inlet.

Today's Map

A small bush plane with over size tires for soft or snow landing strips

A DeHavilland Beaver for sale $385,000

Coming up to the museum you can see some very impressive aircraft, starting with the large PBY 5A Catalina on the left, then the orange and black Grumman Goose in the middle.

A closer look at the PBY

This Goose is immaculate

This pic is very cool. The first thing you see is a Cessna float plane taking off. then look to the left just above the tree line is a 747 lifting off, then to the far right and half way up is a Beaver that just took off.

A DeHavilland DHC-3 Turbo Otter from Rusts Flying Services. One of the top float plane operators in Alaska. I tried to get a flight on their tours several times while I was in the Anchorage area but my fluid schedule made a reservation un practical and I didn't have much luck finding a last minute opening. Next time I will make reservations well in Advance

Busy, Busy, Busy. Three float planes just after take off.

Cars to the left, Planes to the right!