I've even got proof...some nice pictures and a little story.
I was to fly some paragliding guys from Vancouver to Stein Valley. So we met at Vancouver International before dawn to prepare for the ride to that nice airfield. But I had to admit that I've never flown there before. Fortuantely, one of the guys was pretty familiar with that area,so he could provide me with some tips about flying in that area.
Anyways,we took off shortly before dawn,heading east for the mountains.
Our route led us directly over Vancouver,so that I could take a look at the awakening city before we entered the sparsely populated British Columbian mountains.
The weather wasn't that good at first and it was pretty scary seeing some mountain tops breaking through the clouds. So I decided to climb a bit for not getting any bad surprises...
In spite of the weather,we could watch a beautiful sunrise...
The clouds vanished,so I decided to do some canyon flying and descended into the darkness.
The rising sun and the ridges made for a nice background.
But after a near crash with a mountain (couldn't climb that fast with the fully loaded C208 ),I decided to gain some altitude before ending up as a decoration on a mountain.
At 12000 feet,the weather was pretty nice now,no more turbulences,less clouds and the sun provided some more brightness.
I switched the autopilot on and closed my eyes for a few minutes,ignoring the black clouds over me and the brabbling of the paragliding guys in the back of the caravan.
I couldn't sleep that long,because I had to prepare the landing. As I flew over the airfield for the first time,I just thought: "Holy sh**! Thats one hell of a runway!"
But I knew that I could make it, if I didn't touch down to far away from the edge.
I turned for final and had a pretty exciting approach ( I was too low at first),but I made it over the edge and came in for a pretty smooth landing.
Seconds after i touched down, I put the throttle on idle ,slammed in the breaks and tried to prevent the bouncing 208 from leaving the strip to the left or right.
I came to a stop shortly before the other end of the strip and as soon as the 208 stopped moving, I received some applause from behind. I taxiied to the parking spot, stopped the engine and helped the guys unpacking their equipment.
After a nice breakfast, we talked about what to do next.
They wanted me to pick them up on the Lower Stein Valley airfield, located a few thousand feet below after their flight. I agreed - without knowing that Lower Stein Valley also has a nice appraoch path. But more about that later.
I hope you enjoyed and that I haven't bored you too much with those tons of text.
Silent.
