The flight over the Brooks range was an event all by itself, particularly when I consider that it was in a 1953 Dehavilland Beaver. The only other small airplane I have ever been in was a Stearman biplane made in the 30s. I had to wear a leather helmet and cool goggles because the two cockpits were open to the wind. It had the exact same engine as the Beaver, a Pratt Whitney 350 super charged radial beauty.
The first day we departed but much to my displeasure the pilot, after an hour out, could not seem to find a slot between the rather foreboding clouds and the imposing Brooks Range that would allow us to slip over the divide into the Canning Basin. I found myself getting a little concerned as he would tip the air craft to the side and then cant his head sideways trying to see through the clouds looking for that one opening. Then it started to snow and about the same time some guy in a grounded plane told him the conditions were getting dicey, oh, he said icy as well. At the last moment he feathered the wing tabs with primitive dials above the windshield, pushed the old craft up against the steep slope to our right and then banked the plane hard to turn around in the canyon that I though it was no more than a half mile wide.
We obviously had to head back but the following morning the skies opened up and it was off to the mountains again but this time the Gods gave us a beautiful trough right over the big hills. Below us we could see the Dall Sheep scratching out a living mining for a very meager few blades of grass. The mountains stretched for miles in every direction, big peaks, snow and almost no humans. But here and there in some of the distant valleys we could see the camps of hunters and maybe a sign of some human activity, but damn little.
The Dehavilland is rather an incredible craft and while in some ways it is primitive compared to a 747, it does feel very strong. The wings never flap in the wind like the big jets. It is solid, light and gives off the aura of genuine durability. No plastic stuff. I could open the window with a little slide much like is found on a '53 VW bug. If one looks close at the above picture you can see the prop and if you listen closely you can hear the radial engine hammering away. Not a real quiet engine, I must say.
It was all pure pleasure, a credit to man's ingenuity and not something that we can all understand. It was a genuine machine that imitated a bird. We did see a flock of geese just as we passed over the range. The were above us and absolutely thousands of feet in the air heading south. Flight, what an adventure. (To be edited)
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