Naches
Pass Trail Outing
July 28 and 29, 2001: Yakima, WA
The
first report of the Flyover is from Tuck Forsythe.
I'm
sure you'll receive a more complete report (with photos) about Dick
Pingrey's fabulous job of hosting our Naches Pass flights and tour July
28-29, 2001! But I wanted to take the opportunity to say how
enjoyable it was for me.
Saturday
I and my wife Kay participated in Judy Bentley's hike up the west side
of Naches Pass. We found several trees that appear to have bark furrowed
by ropes lowering wagons. So I didn't attend the Saturday part of
Dick Pingrey's trip. But particpants said the flights over the
route from Wallula to Naches River worked out great, followed by a super
Bar BQ dinner at Dick's home in Selah WA.
About 12 of us attended the Sunday field trip. First Dick showed us,
from the ground, a view of (yesterday's flight path) where the Longmire
party 1853 wagon trail had descended to Selah WA over the hill from the
Columbia River. Then we began driving along the 1853 route west
out of Selah. We viewed the Wenas Valley from a hilltop that
showed us the trail route into the Yakima River valley and back west up
towards the Cascades. We drove along where Dick Pingrey had grown
up, and he told several funny tales of his life working on the farm as a
boy. We took our group photo on the front lawn of the home built
ca. 1870's by family of James Longmire, who had been a boy on the 1853
wagon train. And we saw the stone that marks when Yakama Chief
Ow-yi's band of people raised vegetables which the 1853 party traded for
and relished so greatly.
Our vehicles weren't up to traveling on the rest of the wagons' ascent
from the Wenas Valley to the southwest over Rocky Flats into the Little
Naches River valley. So Dick led our cars on a detour around through
Naches town; so we could approach Rocky Flats portion of the wagon route
from the west side. From there Dick showed us the
"macro-view" of the route westward from Selah through Wenas
Valley up to where we stood at the pass near where the route continues
down west into the Little Naches River Valley. The most westward
stop on our field trip was to see trail ruts located along that valley
about 15 miles east of Naches Pass. During the half-mile hike
through the forest, we all had plenty of opportunity to exchange
opinions with each other--as to whether the Forest Service was correct
that those ruts seem to follow the 1853 trail route?
Warren L. "Tuck" Forsythe, Ellensburg WA
From Joyce Bolerjack:
We met at the Yakima Air Field at 9 A.M. and Dick Pingrey who was
hosting the week-end had coffee, doughnuts, muffins, etc. waiting for
everyone. Dick gave a short talk on the history of the McAllister
Museum and a briefing on the flight. By 9:30 most of the planes
had taken off and the weather was perfect and the visability couldn't
have been better. We flew the flight plan (which others can describe
better than I). The flights took approximately two hours.
All the planes were different.
After landing Dick debriefed us on all we had seen and we broke for
lunch. We met back at the airfield museum and drove to Toppenish
where the town has sixty different murals on the walls of buildings
depicting history of the area. From there we drove to the Yakima
Cultural Center.
At six in the evening OCTA members plus our pilots and
spouses met at Dicks beautiful home for a wonderful barbeque. What
a dinner he had planned. Two barbeques going with Bill Arends even
flipping a few of the burgers along with Dick.
A buffet table fit
for a king was laid out before us. For dessert there was a beautiful sheet
cake with OCTA Naches Fly-Over written across the top. Everyone had
a marvelous time and ended the evening in Dick's living room with a
lively discussion about flying.
At
nine the next morning we met in Selah and four cars plus one RV took
the driving tour of sections of the Longmire Trail. Dick had
printed up papers for each day on what we were seeing which were such a
help to novices as myself.
Tuck Forsyth joined us for the Sunday drive and I am sure his
descriptions will tell that part much better than I can. All in
all it was a great outing experience and Dick Pingrey is to be
thanked for showing all the OCTA members who attended a well-planned and
wonderful week-end. Joyce
From Dick Pingree:
I would like to make a comment
or two as organizer of the gang's activities this past weekend.
Perhaps we broke a bit of new ground in that, as far as I know, this is
the first time there has been an organized effort to take OCTA members
on a trail outing by way of flying the route being studied.
For a few people it was their first time in a light airplane and a few
people didn't attend because they were not too certain that flying
was all that safe or enjoyable. We had ten airplanes and ten
highly experienced pilots to fly the group. I think you will find that
those brave enough to do the flying portion found it safe, enjoyable
and very educational. We looked at the
Oregon
Trail from the macroscopic perspective rather than the microscopic
perspective. For the first time many people saw the trail from a
totally different perspective. They were able to look at it 100
miles at a time rather than a few hundred feet at a time. They
could see very clearly why the trail followed that specific route and
the light bulb of understanding suddenly turned on for many people.
In my view we have greatly underused this very important tool in
our study of the Oregon Trail. I hope this is just the start of
OCTA's introduction to viewing the trail from the air. I feel
honored to have been able to help make this event happen. Thanks
to all that attended. You made my day. I hope you all
enjoyed taking the flight as much as I did acting as a pilot guide.
Dick Pingrey
