MY plans yesterday went awry. After careful consideration I had chosen a route back into the Superstitions, criss crossing several jeep trails. As they say... 'the best laid plans'...
I postponed that ride for later in the week, after all it's a very long days' adventure, deciding to take advantage of the warm weather and head in a totally different direction. Turns out, I knew the route, (Deb and I had come this way headed to Baja in '98) well at least some of it. It took me 45 minutes just to get to the west end of the suburban area. Stop and go traffic when you are crossing the city can be tiresome, and this was no exception. I wasn't dressed as heavy as I would normally be riding in Canada, but still had some off road gear on.
It was also my first ride since having the carburetors apart and I was curious to see how the bike performed.
After passing the young city of Surprise, on Bell, and crossing El Mirage Rd (just a block from Sunflower resort, where former MiL Nadia has her winter home) it seems Surprise continues for miles and miles. My first time here on bike, in January 1998, there was nothing much beyond Grand Avenue other than desert!
Crossing a dry wash, I was finally out of the city, time was just past noon. Sun Valley Parkway, is a wide, divided wonderfully paved and virtually empty of traffic, blvd that skirts the White Tank mountain regional park. I don't think I saw more than three or four cars and a couple of bikes heading north into Phoenix and no one passed me as I headed to Buckeye.
After crossing over I 10 the road narrowed and memory kicked in. The Buckeye airport that I remembered had an A 26 Douglas attack bomber dating to WWII as gate guardian. It's still there! On the extreme north end of the airport, I found a hangar complex and U-turned to investigate. The gate was open, there were no signs warning of dangerous dogs, unexploded ordinance (we are very close to both Luke and Barry M. Goldwater military bases after all) nor nuclear waste. *more on this later
What caught my eye was a silver pair of old birds, just inside airport property, sitting there in the desert sun, catching some rays.
A Douglas C-47 Dakota, and a PBY Catalina... what we knew as the DC-3* and Canso amphibian.
Interestingly enough, the Cat is actually a Canadian Vickers built Canso!!!
I parked the bike under the shade provided by the massive starboard wing of the Cat, umm... Canso, dismounted and spent the next hour taking pics.
After running into the local handy guy/mechanic who filled me in on some of the many aircraft stored on site including a whole convoy of military trucks, I even got a tour of the hidden gems stored tightly in a massive hangar.
Outside there was a flying Fairchild C-119, the twin tailed flying boxcar that provided yeoman service for dozens of years to both military and civilian flying transport, another A-26, a CP-121... what we called the Tracker maritime surveillance plane, one of which sits at CFB Summerside as gate guardian, a beautifully restored and flying Grumman Albatross, and a pristine and flying, B-25 Mitchell medium bomber.
The exact same type although later mark, of aircraft that Colonel Jimmy Doolittle and his hand picked, volunteer crew flew off the carrier Hornet April 18, 1942 on the famous and historic, Tokyo raid.
Inside the hangar was a perfectly restored Beech twin, two Piper's, (Bird Dog spotter from war fame) a Stearman and even a Grumman Avenger torpedo bomber, among others.
The entire collection is privately owned by one Mr. Hans (don't laugh you) Lauridsen. Pronounced: Hance Lord sin. *I flew in a DC-3 belonging to Pacific Western airlines on a regular scheduled flight to Fort Mac in the early days. The type was also infamous as the AC-47 gunship, flown in Viet Nam, possessing such firepower that the VC named the plane Dragon, later taken on by the Air Force as "Puff, the Magic Dragon" from a song by the same name.
As most of you know... I love old airplanes nearly as much as bikes... I could have stayed all day, but I was taking up time from the mechanic's duty and still needed to find "Old U.S. 80" for the rest of my tour...
I postponed that ride for later in the week, after all it's a very long days' adventure, deciding to take advantage of the warm weather and head in a totally different direction. Turns out, I knew the route, (Deb and I had come this way headed to Baja in '98) well at least some of it. It took me 45 minutes just to get to the west end of the suburban area. Stop and go traffic when you are crossing the city can be tiresome, and this was no exception. I wasn't dressed as heavy as I would normally be riding in Canada, but still had some off road gear on.
It was also my first ride since having the carburetors apart and I was curious to see how the bike performed.
After passing the young city of Surprise, on Bell, and crossing El Mirage Rd (just a block from Sunflower resort, where former MiL Nadia has her winter home) it seems Surprise continues for miles and miles. My first time here on bike, in January 1998, there was nothing much beyond Grand Avenue other than desert!
Crossing a dry wash, I was finally out of the city, time was just past noon. Sun Valley Parkway, is a wide, divided wonderfully paved and virtually empty of traffic, blvd that skirts the White Tank mountain regional park. I don't think I saw more than three or four cars and a couple of bikes heading north into Phoenix and no one passed me as I headed to Buckeye.
After crossing over I 10 the road narrowed and memory kicked in. The Buckeye airport that I remembered had an A 26 Douglas attack bomber dating to WWII as gate guardian. It's still there! On the extreme north end of the airport, I found a hangar complex and U-turned to investigate. The gate was open, there were no signs warning of dangerous dogs, unexploded ordinance (we are very close to both Luke and Barry M. Goldwater military bases after all) nor nuclear waste. *more on this later
What caught my eye was a silver pair of old birds, just inside airport property, sitting there in the desert sun, catching some rays.
A Douglas C-47 Dakota, and a PBY Catalina... what we knew as the DC-3* and Canso amphibian.
Interestingly enough, the Cat is actually a Canadian Vickers built Canso!!!I parked the bike under the shade provided by the massive starboard wing of the Cat, umm... Canso, dismounted and spent the next hour taking pics.
After running into the local handy guy/mechanic who filled me in on some of the many aircraft stored on site including a whole convoy of military trucks, I even got a tour of the hidden gems stored tightly in a massive hangar.
Outside there was a flying Fairchild C-119, the twin tailed flying boxcar that provided yeoman service for dozens of years to both military and civilian flying transport, another A-26, a CP-121... what we called the Tracker maritime surveillance plane, one of which sits at CFB Summerside as gate guardian, a beautifully restored and flying Grumman Albatross, and a pristine and flying, B-25 Mitchell medium bomber.
The exact same type although later mark, of aircraft that Colonel Jimmy Doolittle and his hand picked, volunteer crew flew off the carrier Hornet April 18, 1942 on the famous and historic, Tokyo raid.
Inside the hangar was a perfectly restored Beech twin, two Piper's, (Bird Dog spotter from war fame) a Stearman and even a Grumman Avenger torpedo bomber, among others.
The entire collection is privately owned by one Mr. Hans (don't laugh you) Lauridsen. Pronounced: Hance Lord sin. *I flew in a DC-3 belonging to Pacific Western airlines on a regular scheduled flight to Fort Mac in the early days. The type was also infamous as the AC-47 gunship, flown in Viet Nam, possessing such firepower that the VC named the plane Dragon, later taken on by the Air Force as "Puff, the Magic Dragon" from a song by the same name.
As most of you know... I love old airplanes nearly as much as bikes... I could have stayed all day, but I was taking up time from the mechanic's duty and still needed to find "Old U.S. 80" for the rest of my tour...
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