Cross country to Canada

"James Robinson" wrote in message
...
Do you really use your guns for getting fish?

Well, ya' see, they're kinda needed for TEXAS fish... Maybe ya' don't need
'em for those wimpy little Canuck fish since they're half froze to death
anyway...

And you've always had this secret desire to freeze your 'nads off,
right? grin

There's a popular TV show here in Canada that gets a lot of laughs
about the ignorance of Americans. I'm sure thay have to talk to a LOT
of Americans to find the material they need to get the laughs, but
there are some hilarious stories about the misconceptions many have
about Canada, Canadians and Canadian weather and topography.
Cold is one of those. In the North the days are very long in
the summer, with the result that there can be vast numbers of huge
insects, hot weather, and people who can grow huge vegetables in their
gardens. So much daylight, see. In the winter it can often be colder
here in southern Alberta (near Montana) than it is 1000 miles north of
here. In the winter in Vancouver and Victoria people are often golfing,
on green grass. Toronto can have wicked winter weather but it's about
as far south as southern Oregon. I grew up In Kamloops, BC, which is
the northern tip of the Sonora Desert, with cactus and sagebrush and
Ponderosa Pine trees and everything. Latitude often has nothing to do
with weather; it's the presence of mountains and water that affects it.
It's very sparsely settled. 80% of Canadians live within 180
miles of the Canada/US border. You want to be prepaped for an
uncomfortable campout if you are forced down. Make sure that ELT is
certified and you have plenty of the right stuff on board, like decent
clothing, food and insect repellent. Bugs can drive people crazy in
short order.
Dan

wrote in message
oups.com...
There's a popular TV show here in Canada that gets a lot of laughs
about the ignorance of Americans. I'm sure thay have to talk to a LOT
of Americans to find the material they need to get the laughs, but
there are some hilarious stories about the misconceptions many have
about Canada, Canadians and Canadian weather and topography.

I'm not above perpetuating the stereotypes of Canada just like I do of
Texas... Of course, for the stereotypes to have developed, there must be
some truth in them...

Cold is one of those. In the North the days are very long in
the summer, with the result that there can be vast numbers of huge
insects, hot weather, and people who can grow huge vegetables in their
gardens. So much daylight, see. In the winter it can often be colder
here in southern Alberta (near Montana) than it is 1000 miles north of
here. In the winter in Vancouver and Victoria people are often golfing,
on green grass. Toronto can have wicked winter weather but it's about
as far south as southern Oregon. I grew up In Kamloops, BC, which is
the northern tip of the Sonora Desert, with cactus and sagebrush and
Ponderosa Pine trees and everything. Latitude often has nothing to do
with weather; it's the presence of mountains and water that affects it.

Hell, if you're gonna bring *logic* into this conversation, I'm leavin'...
grin

What a completely useless response to a good question. There are great many
things in Texas, but beer and fishing are not one of them.

Flying into Canada is quite easy. Canada Customs runs a very efficient
system for general aviation. There is a 1-800 number you call prior to
departure, and after landing. Chances are you will never see a customs
officer. The return back into the US is where you have to plan carefully.
You have to get the number for the port of entry you plan to use (numbers
are not published, use AOPA directory), find out their hours of operation,
and give them an accurate ETA.



"Grumman-581" wrote in
news:uerhe.78802$NU4.52597@attbi_s22:

"JJS" wrote in message ...
I am more comfortable with non-towered airports but have flown
under the Dallas - Fort Worth Class B area some

If you're from (or can go to) Texas, why in the world would you want
to go to Canada????

You'll be hard pressed to find any Lone Star beer up there, only that
caribou **** that they call beer...

You want an answer from the group and you use x-no-archive? Must not
really want an answer, I guess...

"Andrew Sarangan" wrote in message
...
What a completely useless response to a good question. There are great
many
things in Texas, but beer and fishing are not one of them.

Not being from Texas, ya' just wouldn't understand...

"JJS" jschneider@remove socks cebridge.net wrote in message
...
Ladies and gentlemen,

I've been invited on a Canadian fishing trip and would like to fly myself
and one passenger to Red Lake, Ontario.

If this is "just" a fishing trip, have you considered going into, say,
Kenora CYQK, or Thunder Bay CYQT, and having a local operator fly you out to
your destination??? I have no idea of the relative costs, but it would give
you a view of the area and help you make up your mind whether you want to
fly this area (North of Baudette, and especially north of Kenora) without
some bush-flight training.

....snip...

4. Looking over the charts I ordered, the area between Baudette and Red
Lake appears to be full of swamp, lakes and forest with very, very few
emergency landing sites.

A lot of the small commercial operations and most of the private operation
in the area is probably done on floats. This is not just an area of "very
few emergency landing sites", it is also "very few settlements or
habitation", especially north of Kenora.


....snip...
5. For those of you with meteorological crystal balls... What can I
expect for weather conditions in the vicinity of Red Lake and North of the
border in mid - June. I am familiar with the thunderstorms marching
across the plains this time of year but not so familiar with weather
systems that seem to park themselves for days at a time over one area. Is
there much chance of getting weathered in for more than a day or two?

There is *always* a chance of getting weathered in for more than a day or
two (VFR), as there is *always* a chance of getting perfectly flyable
weather for a week or two. I don't have records of ceilings and visibility,
but I do have rainfall. At Red Lake in 1999, for example, there was about
2/10 inch of rain total, for the whole period June 10 to 21, with 5
consecutive no-rain days. In the same period in 2000, the amount of rain
was over 6 inches, and it did NOT rain on only three days in that period.
Now, I suspect a good deal of that was from thunder-showers... but some of
it may have come from low-ceiling drizzle....I have no way of knowing.

In short, it is too early to tell what you will get, with any degree of
certainty.

"Icebound" wrote in message
...

If this is "just" a fishing trip, have you considered going into,
say, Kenora CYQK, or Thunder Bay CYQT, and having a local operator
fly you out to your destination??? I have no idea of the relative
costs, but it would give you a view of the area and help you make up
your mind whether you want to fly this area (North of Baudette, and
especially north of Kenora) without some bush-flight training.

A lot of the small commercial operations and most of the private
operation in the area is probably done on floats. This is not just
an area of "very few emergency landing sites", it is also "very few
settlements or habitation", especially north of Kenora.

There is *always* a chance of getting weathered in for more than a
day or two (VFR), as there is *always* a chance of getting perfectly
flyable weather for a week or two. I don't have records of ceilings
and visibility, but I do have rainfall. At Red Lake in 1999, for
example, there was about 2/10 inch of rain total, for the whole
period June 10 to 21, with 5 consecutive no-rain days. In the same
period in 2000, the amount of rain was over 6 inches, and it did NOT
rain on only three days in that period. Now, I suspect a good deal
of that was from thunder-showers... but some of it may have come
from low-ceiling drizzle....I have no way of knowing.

In short, it is too early to tell what you will get, with any degree
of certainty.

Thanks for the weather info, Icebound. I knew it was a stretch
asking, but was hoping someone was familiar with the area and could
generalize. Your post was helpful.

The trip was planned by other people many months ago. The main guy
that set it up has gone about 10 or 11 years in a row. They were
going to drive up to Red Lake from various parts of the country. A
co-worker invited me to go with them. Rather than drive the 1381
miles which I've been told takes about 24 hours, I'd much prefer to
fly for 10 or 12, and think it would be quite an adventure. We are to
be picked up by float plane at Red Lake and taken into the bush.

I called the float plane company today but the man I was referred to
wasn't there. He is supposed to try and call me back tomorrow. I
fully intend to ask him about preferred routes, but wanted as much
info as possible. Bush pilot training is going to be hard to get in
N.W. Oklahoma.



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"JJS" jschneider@remove socks cebridge.net wrote in message
...

"Icebound" wrote in message
...

....
A lot of the small commercial operations and most of the private
operation in the area is probably done on floats. This is not just an
area of "very few emergency landing sites", it is also "very few
settlements or habitation", especially north of Kenora.

....
The trip was planned by other people many months ago. .......
Rather than drive the 1381 miles which I've been told takes about 24
hours, I'd much prefer to fly for 10 or 12, and think it would be quite an
adventure.

You might want to take the survival-equipment regulations seriously:

http://www.tc.gc.ca/CivilAviation/Re...602.htm#602_61

especially for the 80 nautical miles north of Kenora to Red Lake.

It is *only* 80 miles but you will have to be prepared to be intimidated (on
wheels) if you haven't flown over
sparsely-settled-continuous-forest-and-water areas before. Even so,
although surface settlements are sparse, there ought to be quite a bit of
traffic (float traffic) along that route, especially in the immediate
vicinity of Kenora and Red Lake.

And the YRL VOR and RL ndb should help you find the place, if you are so
equipped :-)

You mentioned that you have the "charts". Do you also have the Aerodrome
Facilities information (Canadian Flight Supplement)
http://makeashorterlink.com/?Q1312341B
You would want the pages for Red Lake, of course, and probably Kenora.
Maybe a few others "near" the route, Ear Lake, Vermillion Bay, etc.

Don't forget that in Canada you *must* file a flight plan with FSS (or a
flight itinerary with a responsible person who will contact FSS), even for
Day VFR.

"Icebound" wrote in message
...

"JJS" jschneider@remove socks cebridge.net wrote in message
...

"Icebound" wrote in message
...

...
A lot of the small commercial operations and most of the private
operation in the area is probably done on floats. This is not
just an area of "very few emergency landing sites", it is also
"very few settlements or habitation", especially north of Kenora.

...
The trip was planned by other people many months ago. .......
Rather than drive the 1381 miles which I've been told takes about
24 hours, I'd much prefer to fly for 10 or 12, and think it would
be quite an adventure.

You might want to take the survival-equipment regulations seriously:

http://www.tc.gc.ca/CivilAviation/Re...602.htm#602_61

especially for the 80 nautical miles north of Kenora to Red Lake.

It is *only* 80 miles but you will have to be prepared to be
intimidated (on wheels) if you haven't flown over
sparsely-settled-continuous-forest-and-water areas before. Even so,
although surface settlements are sparse, there ought to be quite a
bit of traffic (float traffic) along that route, especially in the
immediate vicinity of Kenora and Red Lake.

And the YRL VOR and RL ndb should help you find the place, if you
are so equipped :-)

You mentioned that you have the "charts". Do you also have the
Aerodrome Facilities information (Canadian Flight Supplement)
http://makeashorterlink.com/?Q1312341B
You would want the pages for Red Lake, of course, and probably
Kenora. Maybe a few others "near" the route, Ear Lake, Vermillion
Bay, etc.

Don't forget that in Canada you *must* file a flight plan with FSS
(or a flight itinerary with a responsible person who will contact
FSS), even for Day VFR.

I had not ordered the Aerodrome Facilities information yet. I will
do so, ASAP. I'll take the survival regs seriously as well. Thanks
again.



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"JJS" jschneider@remove socks cebridge.net wrote in message
...

"Icebound" wrote in message
...

....snip...

There is *always* a chance of getting weathered in for more than a day or
two (VFR), as there is *always* a chance of getting perfectly flyable
weather for a week or two. ...snip...

Thanks for the weather info, Icebound.

While on the weather topic....

Before your final legs, try to get to an internet machine and look up:

http://weatheroffice.ec.gc.ca/canada_e.html
especially the radar link at
http://weatheroffice.ec.gc.ca/radar/index_e.html?id=XDR

This is the weather-radar near Dryden, and covers the final leg of your
route.

From the left margin of those pages is the link to "aviation weather" which
will give you free on-line access to the usual gamut of
aviation-weather-briefing materials TAFs, METARs, analysis charts, upper
winds, etc., etc..... which you might want to peruse in addition to your FSS
briefing...