The new & the busy

Long time no update on things here in Alaska, once again my summer has gone from the calm to the Chaos but I think that's the name of the game with summers here. Below is some of what's been happening but not all as my computer has been on the fritz so getting there few on here has been a challenge.

Not the best picture but this is me and some of our guys jacking a cabin to the east and running new braces under it after an earthquake caused it to shift a couple inches.

An evening stroll around Lake Hood waiting to pick people up at Ted Stevens International Airport

This project was quite a story. Brian Lites & Ryan Anders Mechanics from MFI came to help us do the annual on the DC-3 and after long 16 hr days working up to the day they left they go the DC-3 finally started. This was at the Palmer airport at 11:30 at night after trying most of the day to get the left engine going. This is the Mechanics spinning the prop to increase the tension when working to get one of the engines started the night before they were leaving. Didn't get it going this night but got it going before they left, Praise the Lord!

Running DC-3 was a big praise of seeing God get that going so they could do the fuel and supply run up to camp this week.

 

When I get my computer up and running again I'll put up more pictures of what is going on here at the ranch. Thanks for your prayers for the summers ministry.

 

The rest of the trip north to AK

The trip from Nebraska went well. We hit snow in Northern Wyoming but after that we had great weather through Montana and had a great lunch with a KAC friend in Billings on the way north. 

We then headed from Montana north and made it to Lethrbridge BC over the boarder and spent the night there. The weather wasn't looking so good for the normally beautiful drive through the Canadian Rockies from Banff to Hinton the next day but we prayed about it and God gave us good weather and high enough clouds to enjoy His creation along the way. 

Lake Louise was beautiful but you couldn't see the bright blue color of the water through the ice but it was a nice break and a good place to stretch our legs and have a little snowball fight.

We had a nice picnic lunch along the way through the rockies and enjoyed the day God gave us. 

 We pressed on from the Rockies and had 2 good long days of driving stopping in Grande Prairie the one night and then making it to Watson Lake the next. Watson lake is famous for its signpost forest with thousands of signs of all kinds. It's an interesting stop in the middle of nowhere where thousands have left their mark or represented their home town.

We had a great trip making good time and seeing lots of creatures along the way including bears, wolf, caribou, elk, fox, swan, bison, and stone sheep.

We arrived in Tok AK Wednesday evening and spent the night there and left early Thursday morning to make it to the Ranch at 10:30 that morning. Its been a busy weekend unpacking, visiting people and places and starting the big job of getting things ready for another summer of ministry. Becky has jumped right in to her project and will have it done in no time and will be looking for more to do. Thanks for all who prayed and helped with this trip. God has been so good.

The big trip north

So we decided that it would be best to have Carolyn's good car in AK and that I should drive it up. It's the long way but I was hoping after the fast more stressful fall trip to have the chance to make the trip across the country again.

On my way north I got to spend a night with my sister and her kids in Yorktown, Virgina

Then I spent the night with our friends the Barnhart's in Camp Hill PA where I met my mom, Mary, and Becky my copilot on this trip.

Night 3 spent in Indiana at my cousin Liz's. Fun to catch up with them and see where they live.

Night 4 was in Thedford, NE so I could get up and go to the wedding of my friend Amy in Mullen.

Nebraska was a new state, the west was quite pretty and lots of train to make the miles go by

The busy, wonderful everyday

Since we got back from Florida we have had a busy schedule of people coming and going to work and visit, planes that need work done to get them ready to go to Alaska, some flying, flight training, painting and repairing. God is good and we are getting lots done, and lots is still left to do.

Here's the guys and gal working hard to get the engine off the 172 heading for Burma. We had a group of 4 engineers that came and camped out and helped us a couple days get the engine off cleaned and took a trunk load of parts back out to Texas with them. It was a great team and a great time of encouragement to see the body of Christ working together for the furtherance of the gospel through aviation.

There were lots of nice sunsets for the guys to fly off into. Lots of fun to watch and see them get some practice in the Citabria.

The guys pulling the engine apart and learning more about engines.

We had an easter weekend visit from the Hinton Family, old friends of Dwayne and Carolyn. This was the typical trying to get Dwayne off the phone and to focus for a picture.

Oh wait that's a better one.

There was a late night in the hanger, painting the elevators to go on the 180 tail.

Then we got to put them back on so hopefully it will be up and flying again soon.

Farewell Florida

We are back in South Carolina after out 4 whirlwind week in Florida. It was a blessing to be among our friends and partners in ministry at MFI and put faces with so many names. I wanted to share of few more pictures of our time at MFI, visiting people, and meeting aviation enthusiasts.

Dwayne was the official cotton candy maker at the MFI family day one weekend, he now firmly believes we need one, all mothers disagree.

 We spent most of our Sundays in at the Family Worship Center in Indiantown, Florida and made many new friends there and are hopeful that some of them will be a part of the work projects in Russia.

Some of the guys that we worked with at MFI on this DC-3 that they were doing an inspection on and used to teach us.

Dwayne working with Zack to show him how to grease the axles

We did spend our last day in Fort Pierce running over to the other side of the state to meet up with a DC-3 friend of Dwayne's and enjoyed seeing has collection of aircraft and sharing with him more about Kingdom Air Corps vision for ministry with our DC-3.

The gentleman we visited had this DC-3 which is the 6th DC-3 ever produced and the oldest one in existence today.

We also ran over to visit a friend who does cropdusting. The guys had fun climbing around on these sweet high-tech planes.

We spent Palm Sunday with a Russian family who Dwayne has know for many years and we enjoyed getting to know their family and share about what Kingdom Air Corps is doing to spread the gospel with their church.

Way down south

On the road again... we have been in Florida 3 weeks and will be here another week before heading back "north" to SC and then slowly heading up north slowly and will be up in AK before long. A few pictures of some of what has been going on. I don't have any pictures of the paperwork aspect of the job that I have been doing but a few pictures of the work we have been doing on our 172 we have down here and the planes here at MFI.

 The C-47 that the guys are helping the MFI mechanics  annual and learn more of the inspection procedures on a DC-3

 One of MFI's DC-3s flying in from their flight to Haiti

 We have also been working on our 172 down here and have been the airports entertainment watching the Alaskans work on their plane.

 Dwayne's been teaching us all about working on our plane too while we are down here.

 Even I have spent a couple days helping out on the plane, taking off flaps, degreasing them and stripping the paint off.

 Ran into another Crane in the hangar the other day when we were there working

Sometimes you just gotta make due and make an office with what you can where you are...

A few more miles part 2

The remainder of our trip in the southwest went smoothly, we had a nice time in Oklahoma catching up with Kingdom Air friends, seeing a bit of the Chickasaw culture native to Southern Oklahoma, eating local cuisine, and getting some planning and preparation done for the upcoming year with our KAC bookkeeper. 

 Friends we met at King Ranch this past summer from Northern Texas

 The Oklahoman speciality of fried pies which we enjoyed for breakfast one day

 We saw a bit of snow on our way through Tennessee on our last day's drive but thankfully no incidents

Dwayne's been busy getting back into working on planes since we got back. Got this plane started for the first time since it was donated this week!