Heading to the Valdez Fly-In

It’s been a chilly spring in Alaska, but despite the cold, May brings all the usual spring activities that marks the beginning of our busy season exploring Alaska.

The first weekend of May is spent at the Great Alaska Aviation Gathering, where Woodsen has made it a tradition to enter our Cessna 185 in the Show-and-Shine static display. Besides the fun of displaying our airplane, which we’ve lovingly dubbed “The Family Wagon,” and sharing how we use it, Woodsen highly enjoys the unique opportunity to land at the fairgrounds. This year, we were excited to get 1st (out of three airplanes) in the Sky Wagon category, which came with plenty of prize loot that Woodsen and the kids were excited about.

The weekend of the Aviation Gather is also traditionally when Jack Hart, or Uncle Jack, as the kids have come to know him, comes to town. In 2024, after spending many springs in Alaska with Jack, we had the opportunity to visit him at his home in West Yellowstone. You can read more about that adventure here.

The second weekend in May brings the Valdez Fly-in, which is another stop on our annual spring circuit. The weekend of the fly-in coincides with the last week of school for our kids, which means we attend the school’s promotion/graduation ceremony on Friday before heading to Valdez. This year at the ceremony, besides being promoted to the next grade, Yukla received recognition for athletics, Melozi received recognition for athletics and her positive attitude, and Atlee received awards for academics and leadership 🙂 I’m one proud Mama over here!

In Woodsen’s experience, the weather in Valdez is best earlier in the day, so putting off our departure till 4:30 has him antsy to get out the door. After the promotion, we quickly left and headed to the already-packed plane.

The blue skies Woodsen had seen on the cameras along the way to Valdez earlier in the day were nowhere to be found. Now, low ceilings accompanied us to Valdez.

Thankfully, the weather cooperated, and it even turned out to be a smooth ride. Jack, who drives to Valdez every spring, greeted us as we arrived. Over the years, we’ve gone back and forth between camping on the tarmac and staying in a hotel in town. The last few years, we’ve opted to camp under the wing and enjoyed the convenience of having our camp near the festivities, which makes naps and sharing meals with friends easy. With the airport a few miles out of town, it’s also nice not to have to worry about transportation to and from the airport.

Friday night at the Fly-in is the Potluck/BBQ, which had a decent attendance thanks to the 20-30 planes that had already made their way to Valdez. After eating and visiting a bit, we headed back to the tent to start getting the kids ready for bed. Usually, we put our two younger kids to bed first, then the older ones later, but with music blaring from the BBQ till 10:30, bedtime was a bit chaotic. Eventually, everyone fell asleep.

It rained most of the night, and the morning greeted us with a lingering drizzle and a chill in the air. We put on extra layers, huddled around the heater, and I savored my hot coffee. After everyone was fed, we headed to the terminal to warm up and read the books provided in the kid-friendly corner of the terminal.

After warming up, we headed back outside to explore the static displays, watch aerobatics, check out the vendors, and see if we could name the various types of planes lining the tarmac.

We headed back to the airplane for lunch, then staged our campchairs near the festivities to watch the Short Take Off and Landing (STOL) competition and let Eska take a lunchtime snooze. She got a good nap in despite the noisy bursts of airplane engines revving up for takeoff.

While most people might say the climax of the airshow revolves around the experimental or Supercub class, I’ll never forget my first time in Valdez watching the Turbine Otter and Helio Courier perform. I couldn’t get over their impressive performance and must have been very verbal about my amazment. Ever since, Woodsen, Jack, and I have joked about how someday I will upgrade and get a Helio and an Otter. Ha, well a girl can dream! While there was no turbin Otter competing this year, I thoroughly enjoyed watching two helios show off their impressive STOL capabilities.

The rest of the day was filled with bubbles, buckets of lemonade, glimpses of blue sky, chalk with endless pavement, and finally a trip to Fu Kung with Jack for dinner.

The next day was Mother’s Day, and Jack and I planned to continue the tradition of starting the day with an early-morning run. At 7:30, Jack pulled up by our tent to pick me up, and we headed into town for to Blueberry Hill and back. The day before, I had also made plans with my friend Rachel, who lives in Valdez, to go for a paddle in the bay. After our run, Jack dropped me off at Kayaker’s Beach, where I met Rachel, and we headed out in kayaks.

We paddled along, happily distracted by chatting and the view, and only managed to make it to the end of Blueberry Hill, which was where Jack and I had just run to. After our paddle, Rachel dropped me off at the airport, where aerobatic demonstrations were in full swing. The low cloud coverage made the demonstration even more dramatic then the day before.

We finished off our time in Valdez with the kids’ balsa plane competition, then it was back to the airplane to pack and load up. Once loaded, we said our goodbyes and took off towards the bay, flying through Prince William Sound and over the pass at Portage. We stopped in Anchorage for a Mother’s Day lunch before continuing our journey home to Wasilla.

Till next time Valdez!