I always liked airplanes. I loved when my parents took me to the local airport in Porto Alegre when I was growing up.  The photo below is from the Aeroporto Internacional Salgado Filho (Salgado Filho International Airport) in Porto Alegre.  Although the photo is from before my time, and the airport had a few changes done to it by the time I frequented it, the main structure remained intact. In fact, Porto Alegre has a new airport, but this old airport, with some expansions and the typically unfortunate remodeling done to it, remains as a terminal to the new airport.

Aeroporto Internacional Salgado Filho, Porto Alegre. Photo from 1955

The airport had a café and observation deck on its second floor, the top floor on the wing to the left of the air traffic control tower as seen on the photo above. That was my favorite part of the airport. From there I would stand at the edge of the rail and would watch  planes landing and taking off.  I also enjoyed looking at the patio, watching with attention the planes arriving at the gate and all the action that took place to get the plane ready for passengers to deplane, and then getting the planes ready for boarding for a next flight. I was always wondering where the people came from, where they were going. I always wanted to be on a flight, going somewhere, the location was not important, being in a plane was.  Another focus of my attention while at the airport was a large mural on one wall of the terminal, depicting aviation themes, titled the “Conquest of Space.” I used to spend time observing that mural, painted by internationally known local artist Aldo Locatelli.

Aldo Locatelli’s Mural, in Porto Alegre’s old airport (photo borrowed from the internet).

Aviation lost the glamour it had in the 60’s when it jump started my travel dreams.  Today it is mostly an efficient conveyor belt of passengers and cargo to everywhere in the world. However, I still like airplanes and traveling by plane as much as did in my first flight when I was 12, on a Boeing 737 on a short flight between Montevideo, Uruguay and Buenos Aires, Argentina.  My job of the last 15 years takes me to many places in the United States and to pacific islands, allowing me to enjoy the flying experience often.

Just yesterday I had dinner with my friend Doug and he was talking about taking flying lessons, checking my interest in joining him on flying lessons. At one point when I was in high school I wanted to be a commercial airline pilot. On a student job fair at my high school I managed to get the local airline, VARIG, among other materials and brochures, to lend me a cutout of an actual airplane turbine that was placed as part of my exhibit of what were the steps to start an airline pilot career (VARIG was known to have a top-tier pilot training program in Porto Alegre). They even delivered and installed it.

I did not become a pilot but eventually I did fly a plane for a short while here at the Columbia Gorge, with a friend who was building hours to get her instructor’s license. Based on that experience I told Doug I like better the motorcycle riding experience, the flying close to the ground feeling I get when riding. The reactions to commands are faster and precise, I get a better feel for the speed, it seems I’m going faster in the motorcycle than I was in the plane. The motor sounds and the vibration experience are better in the motorcycle. It is interesting that I like flying, but if I have the chose between flying or riding, riding wins by a great margin. But it was connecting these two passions, airplanes and riding, that leads me to this post of my trip to visit the Evergreen Aviation Museum in McMinnville, Oregon, on May 5th, 2013.  The main goal was to check the Spruce Goose, a remarkable airplane, one of the milestones in the history of aviation despite being flown only once and for only a short mile, barely off the ground (water, actually) at a 70ft maximum altitude. The bike of choice for this excursion was the Multistrada.

Getting the Multistrada Ready for Another Adventure. May 5th, 2013

It was going to be a warm day. It was as if we went from Winter to Summer in one week. I knew it was going to be a long day, so the plan was to start as early as possible, let’s say leave by 8:00 am, I deliberated with myself.  And as it is usual with my motorcycle trips, It took me a while longer to leave the house. It was after 9:00 am when my trip started. I took the back roads north until I connected to the Valley of the Kings Road, after my pit stop for non-ethanol gas in Philomath.  Then a short stop in Dallas, Oregon.

The man and his machine. Dallas, Oregon. May 5th, 2013

I had been to McMinnville before, but had forgotten how this old town remains up-to-date but mostly intact with its old format. It seems it remains viable today, with a nice downtown area with tree-lined streets, with stores and restaurants and what it seemed like a critical mass of cars and people. I am not sure but it seems to me that it remains viable for its local population, with benefits from tourism, mostly because of its proximity to Portland, and from keeping the downtown area mostly unchanged.

McMinnville, OR. May 5th, 2013

They also have their art deco movie theater.  It seems the Mack Theater still works as a movie theater. Perhaps it benefited from the Save American Cinemas movement, like the Rio theater in the town of Sweet Home, as I described on my post of a few weeks back.

Movie Theater, McMinnville, May 5th, 2013

The Evergreen Aviation Museum is not too far from downtown McMinnville. And it is difficult to miss it since one of the three main buildings has a 747 parked on top of it, posing in what seems like a take off position.

Boeing 747 on top of building, Evergreen Aviation Museum. McMinnville, OR. May 5th, 2013

As I walked towards the building housing the Spruce Goose, where you will also find other pre-1960’s airplanes, I saw this Douglas C-47 parked just outside the building.  These planes played an important role carrying soldiers and cargo in the WWII. And its passenger version, the famous DC-3, played a significant role in commercial aviation. But this airplane reminded me of something else,which distracted me from the Spruce Goose.

C-47 at the Evergreen Aviation Museum. McMinnville, OR, May 5th, 2013

My mother had two older sisters, I never met the older one. In 1957 my mother’s older sister, Therezinha de Leão Lemiszek, who already had three children at that time, flew from Porto Alegre to Bagé, which is 380 km (236 miles) south of Porto Alegre, at the border between Brazil and Uruguay. Both towns are in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, in the pampas, the only gaucho area in Brazil.  She went to Bagé to visit her younger sister, my Aunt Gisela, who had just had a baby. On the way back from Bagé to Porto Alegre, the plane she was traveling, a VARIG airlines Curtiss C-46, crashed near the Bagé airport, killing all 40 passengers and crew on board.

My uncle, Gisela’s husband, had taken my aunt Therezinha to the airport in Bagé. He waited until the plane took off and saw the incident. Either that or he heard about it on the radio and turned around, rushing back to the airport. What I have heard from family stories is that he drove his 4 x 4, which I believe was a Land Rover at that time, all the way to the crash site.  In fact, if my memory of the account is correct, he was the first at the crash site and located my aunt who was already dead at that time.

VARIG Curtiss C-46

Meanwhile, my other uncle, the husband of Aunt Therezinha, heard the news about the crash when he got to the Porto Alegre airport to pick her up. At that moment VARIG was getting a plane ready to go to the crash site to manage the situation and investigate the accident. My uncle was an Engineer and somehow made his way into that plane. People on the plane thought he was a VARIG engineer, and only found out he was a relative of one of the victims during the flight to Bagé.

VARIG Curtiss C-46 Commando

I may have some of the story points mixed up, information is missing, but I know the two facts about my two uncles, husbands of my mother’s older sisters: one was at the crash site, the other flew to Bagé with the group of VARIG’s staff that went to manage the crash site and investigate the crash.  By the way, VARIG stands for Viação Aérea RioGrandense, or Rio Grande do Sul Airlines.  This airline started in my state and became the largest commercial airline in Brazil until its demise, about 10-15 years ago. I flew a VARIG Boeing 747 on my first trip to the United States in 1987, landing at JFK on my way to start my studies at the Ohio State University.

The museum didn’t have a Curtiss C-46 on the exhibit.  But of similar vintage and purpose, besides the C-47 parked outside, they had a DC-3 inside.

DC-3 at the Evergreen Museum, McMinnville, OR. May 5th, 2013

That was an interesting diversion from my original goal for this trip.  I’m glad it took me to research more about that accident, including its registry. Back to my original intent for this trip, what about that Spruce Goose? I could not miss it, this thing is really a gigantic beast.  My camera did not have  a lens wide enough to capture the entire plane in one shot from within the confines of the building.

The Spruce Goose at the Evergreen Aviation Museum

This entire building of the museum is a hanger for the beast. Many of the smaller aircraft in the exhibit are parked under its wings.

The Spruce Goose at the Evergreen Aviation Museum

Below is a photo taken inside the beast, looking at the tail end of the plane, with a human figure to give an idea of scale.

The tail of the Spruce Goose, with a human figure to give an idea of the scale and the dimensions of this beast.

This airplane was a result of a commission by the U.S. government to the Hughes Aircraft Company to build a large flying boat capable of carrying men and materials over long distances, after the US entered the WWII, in 1941.  Check here for an account of the story of this plane, and of the only time it flew from the LA Times.  It remains a tribute or maybe a reminder, to the fine line between audacity and stubbornness, or between perhaps courage and eccentricity. Howard Hughes, the designer and owner of Hughes Aircraft Company could be placed either on the audacity or eccentricity sides of this spectrum.

Many planes fit under the wings of the Spruce Goose

Time was flying, so I got back to my bike, studied the map briefly and took off towards the coast, the long way south toward my house.

The bike in front of the Evergreen Aviation Museum

I took Hwy 18 towards the coast. Just when I was getting close to Grand Ronde, just about passing half way to get to Lincoln City from McMinnville, I got on a traffic jam. That’s when motorcycle filtering would have helped tremendously. Instead, by Oregon law, I was there on the hottest part of the day, sitting on stop-and-go traffic in the middle of nowhere.  After some 20 minutes or more of this nonsense I took my chances and carefully drove on the berm of the road for a few hundred yards until I found my way to an alternate route, via Hwy 22 and eventually the little Nestucca Hwy toward the coast.

I was enjoying my ride on a new road to me, nice curves on a rather narrow old road. I slowed down to get on a one-lane bridge when a sport bike of the Japanese variety (in-line 4 sound was practically all I’ve noticed) flew by me.  This guy was really going fast and caught me completely by surprise!

I continued and after a short while I came upon a group of bikes, six or seven, going slower than me, mostly cruisers. As I generally do, I stayed behind them waiting for an opportunity to pass all of them in one move.  I kept my distance, enough distance to make a move when the opportunity arrived and not being too close to the last guy. And this went on for a couple of miles.  At some point, on a tighter left hander, I noticed their speed was quite good, but maybe too fast for such a tight curve.  I kept paying attention to their last rider directly ahead of me.  I was thinking this guy was going to run out of room as he would need to lean more if he would keep pace of the others, he did not slow down his cruiser.  I started slowing down. And bam!, I saw it coming, his pegs hit the ground and he starts losing real estate pretty quickly.  But this guy was good. Somehow he saved it, going off the road, I imagine the crash, but he kept riding on the gravel outside of the curve, where there wasn’t much more than a few feet before he would hit trees or fall on a ditch. He never stopped, he found his balance, got back on the road, looked down to check the left peg, and kept going as if nothing had happened. Kudos for the guy!

Soon we hit some flats, we were already close to the coast, and I managed to pass all the bikes in one move.  I joined Hwy. 101 several miles north of Lincoln City.

The bike at the coast, somewhere on 101 close to Lincoln City. May 5th, 2013

I was hoping for some relief from the heat, which is generally the case on the coast, but it was not the case this time. The ocean was uncharacteristically blue, not too much wind, temperature was reading 89 at the bike’s thermometer.  It felt as if I was in South California.

Somewhere near Lincoln City. May 5th, 2013

However, as I continued south on 101 I noticed a significant wind change. Wind started blowing from the south and south west and the temperature started a radical move to the lower part of the thermometer. From 89 it got as low as 59 by the Heceta Lighthouse, 30 degrees in less than 40 miles. Fog set in and the ocean water changed from blue to gray to greenish/brown. I had never seen such a quick change, so radical in terms of temperature and Ocean water.

Same day, different look on the ocean, fog setting in. Heceta Lighthouse, May 5th, 2013

And as I continued south and arrived in Florence the weather cleared and the temperature was a bit warmer than 59. By the way, I was just about running out of gasoline.  The traffic jam, the long detour and the wind change were all conspiring against my plan to ride to Florence for a non-ethanol gasoline gas station.  But somehow I managed to ride 205 miles in one tank, made it to the gas station with 5 miles to spare according to the bike’s computer.

I like this bike’s range!

And because the bike took only 4.4 gallons, it makes 46.6 mpg.  Not bad at all.

205 miles, 4.4 gallons.

From there it was a short burst back home on my well-known Hwy 36, the temperatures went back to the high 80’s soon after I got a few miles out of the coast area.  Made it home at about 5 pm, a long day.

327 miles (526 km)

Coming up next, a short ride for a can of chain lube that eventually took me on a longer tour, a visit with friends, an old Packard, and a tribute to a dear friend.