Prologue - Setting the stage for our trip

This trip’s background is as circuitous as the route we expect to take.  I am an active duty member of the Army currently stationed at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.  My wife, Liz, and I found out in December 2012 that we were being assigned to Fort Wainwright, AK.  This was very exciting news.  We thoroughly enjoyed a previous assignment to Alaska from 2005 to 2009.  It was during this tour that two of our three children were born. It was also in Alaska that we purchased our first plane, a 1953 Cessna 180, and I learned to fly.

In an effort to frame the trip, I should start with some of the facts.   Liz, our three children (Brayden – 7, Carly – 4, and Declan – 1), and I are moving from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas to Fort Wainwright, Alaska.  We have to move out of our house on Fort Leavenworth and move all of our things, including our two cars and our airplane, to Fort Wainwright.  Liz and I are originally from Florida and our families are still in our hometowns. Since Alaska is quite far for our families to travel, we will be stopping in Florida enroute to see them before moving. In addition, my daughter from a previous marriage will be graduating from high school.  My father, mother, and Uncle Norris will be accompanying us on the journey, partly for assistance and partly to participate in the adventure.  

The following dates drive the requirements of our trip:

-        5 June – My daughter, Paige’s, graduation from high school in Tampa, Florida

-        14 June – My graduation from an Army school at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas

-        1 July – Liz’s first day of work with BLM on Fort Wainwright.

-        6 July – My report date to Fort Wainwright

Anyone who has moved understands the mixture of excitement and anxiety that controls your emotions during the process.  Our preparation for this move is no different.  Our excitement at moving back to Alaska is tempered by the anxiety of planning all the parts of the move.  To simplify the many tasks, I’ve broken them into five main efforts:

-        Pack and ship our household goods

-        Visit family in Florida and attend my daughter’s high school graduation

-        Attend my own graduation from an Army school at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas

-        Liz and the girls driving to Alaska

-        Flying the Stationaire to Alaska with my dad, son, and uncle

Movers will pack our household belongings on 23, 24, and 28 May.  They load the truck on the 29th, and we move out of our on-base house on 31 May.  Tucked tightly in and around this timeline, we are attending the supercub.org fly-in at Gaston’s over Memorial Day weekend and departing Fort Leavenworth on 1 June for Florida.  One additional muscle movement involved in the move is shipping one of our cars.  The government ships one of our vehicles on contract transport.  There are select locations around the country to drop the vehicle off, called vehicle-processing centers.  The closest vehicle-processing center is in St. Louis.  To ensure we have something to drive when we arrive in Fairbanks, I’ll ship our Toyota RAV4 on 17 May.  It will arrive by 17 June and be picked up by a good friend.  If all goes according to plan, it will be sitting in our parking spot on the East Ramp at Fairbanks International when we arrive.

This leads to the journey’s actual beginning.  Through the month of June, I will be travelling with a combination of family from Fort Leavenworth, KS to St. Petersburg, FL, then to Fairbanks, AK.  I’ll attempt to explain the trip’s combination of legs, methods, and family members, but referring to the diagram below might explain it better.  Liz, the kids, and I depart Fort Leavenworth on 1 June for St. Petersburg/Tampa in the airplane.  The only thing we will leave at Leavenworth is our Toyota Camry.  During the first week in Florida, we are taking the kids to Disney and attending Paige’s graduation.  I travel back to Leavenworth via commercial airline from 9 to 14 June.  Liz, Carly, Declan, and my mom depart Tampa on 16 June via airline to Kansas City.  From there, they will drive the Camry up the AL/CAN highway to Fairbanks.  I depart Florida with Brayden, my dad, and my uncle Norris.  We are flying the airplane from Tampa to Fairbanks.  There are sketchy plans for the guys and girls to meet up along the route.  We might also make a stop in Ohio to visit my brother.

Hopefully this graphical representation of our move will help clear up who is riding in what and to where.

 Our “airsheen”, as CloudDancer would call it in his CloudDancer Alaska Chronicles, is a 1979 Cessna U206G.  For those not familiar with small airplanes, this is a six-seat, single piston-engine, fixed landing gear airplane with the wings over the cabin (referred to as high-wing).  We purchased 5XV in 2011 as an upgrade from the four-seat that I learned to fly in Alaska.  We simply exceeded the seat to butt ratio between the airplane and our family.  I have two years and just over 200 hours figuring out this newer, larger airplane.  The craft is more than capable for the trip with a 310 HP Continental IO-550 engine, 88 usable gallons of fuel, two instrument flight rules (IFR) certified GPSs, engine monitor, short takeoff and landing (STOL) kit, 406 ELT, and Reiff engine preheater.  I’m slightly concerned about damage from gravel at some of the airports along the way and once we reach Alaska.  Although I’m familiar with all the techniques to prevent this, there is always the chance of dinging the prop or kicking a stone up into the tail.  This doesn’t limit what I do, but I still want to keep her as nice as I can.

This is "5XV", our Cessna Stationaire.

 The remaining chapters of this log will detail our trek starting with the departure from Leavenworth on 1 June.  My intent is twofold.  Primarily, I intend to document the journey for the sake of our family.  This is sure to be a monumental trip with memories around almost every bend.  Secondly, I hope to journal details of the trip to help anyone else that plans to do the same.  Now is as good a point as any to inform you that I’m not a writer.  Surely, you’ve already figured this out.  I’ve spent my entire adult life in the Army.  Thus, I write in a direct and concise manner.  I’m also a relatively inexperienced pilot.  I’ve been flying Army helicopters since 2002, but I didn’t start flying airplanes until 2007.  Even then, my abilities as a pilot caused my instructor to laugh uncontrollably at me during pattern training.  Hopefully we can all look past my poor writing and exceptionally mediocre flying skills to harvest some memories and value from the experience.