Page 20 - Sept23T

Back in Time
by Kevin Ware
Flying B Ranch (12ID).
Pilots are very fortunate people. The airplanes we f ly not only take us to places most never get to see, but they can also
take us back in time.
For those of you following my sto-
ries over the past two years, I have been trying to return to a time when my flying was much simpler than the complex, turbine, high-altitude stuff I had been doing. My recent fight ex- perience has involved single-engine airplanes, mostly VFR. Toward that end, I bought a Cessna 180, which I
placed on amphibious f loats, and I have since been flying it to places I never could land when operating f light-level capable turbines.
One of the areas I planned to visit in my new simplified flying life was backcountry Idaho, where, 30 years ago, I had flown into quite a bit in a Cessna 185 I owned at the time. The question, of course, was, to where ex- actly should I go back? That is a more complicated question than you might think because three decades ago, I had no problem camping out in a tent,
sleeping on the cold, hard ground, not showering for a week, and eating out of cans for days. But now, somewhat older (hopefully wiser), I look for ac- commodations with more civilized amenities and comforts.
As I was considering this prob- lem and wondering if I wanted to camp out again at Johnson Creek (a well-known Idaho backcountry airport) as I did years ago, I got an email from Gil Collver, a friend, Turbo Commander, owner and avid Twin & Turbine reader, who said I
18 • TWIN & TURBINE / September 2023