I heard about the Gull Lake Fly-in through a pilot I follow on Instagram. I thought it sounded like a great experience so I asked my commercial instructor, Nathan, if he'd like to go with me. He was excited about it and, by the time the day came, three others, all pilots, had decided to come along, too! We set off from Cooking Lake in two planes, three in ours, with Nathan's student in the back, and two in the other.
It was cold and windy but it was one of those unbeatable blue-sky Alberta days! Gull Lake is 65 nautical miles southwest of Cooking Lake, about 40 minutes in the air. The flight there, over the central Alberta prairies, was stunningly beautiful!
Gull Lake is a big lake so we could see it in the distance, with the Rocky Mountains as a backdrop. The ice runway is on the southern edge of the lake so I flew out wide over the lake to join the downwind for runway 30 straight in.
Another plane was arriving from the east, moving faster than we were, and he wanted to land on 12. So to make that work, I crossed over the field from mid-downwind 30 to join the downwind for 12. My approach went over the open lake. There was a hefty crosswind, but I judged my turn to final just right and rode the centerline in. Nathan reminded me to slow down a bit, which was helpful, since I was focusing pretty hard on that narrow strip of clear ice! My landing was lovely. I was surprised by how rough the surface was and I figured out quickly to be careful of braking too hard. We rolled out to the end and taxied off, taking our place in the long line of parked airplanes.
Several people approached our plane (the white one in the picture) to welcome us, which was so nice! The organizer welcomed me by name; I had emailed him earlier about the event and I guess he knew it was me since I was the only female pilot there! We climbed out and found our friends, Ben and Aaron, who had arrived in the other plane, just minutes before us. My Instagram pilot friend found me and we met each other in person. Once we were all together, we walked off the lake and up the road to the community hall where they had coffee, hot chocolate, apple cider, and hotdogs. We sat outside the hall in a circle around the firepit, where we ate, roasted marshmallows, and laughed our heads off. When it was time to go, we climbed onto the hay wagon, which took us back out onto the ice, to our waiting airplanes.
Morgan, Nathan's student, flew us home. I rode in the backseat, which was so relaxing, and enjoyed the view. This was a very fun event and it was surreal to land on a lake! This was one of those incredible, pinch-yourself pilot experiences.