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Long Time Since I Shot an MD-11 Touchdown

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MD-11 freighters are still a big part of the UPS fleet.  In visits to Boeing Field before I lived up here, I got to see them quite often.  For some reason, my more recent visits have not included many MD-11s.  However, one nice evening with pleasant light, a UPS MD-11 was due in.  They were on a northerly flow so a touchdown shot was not a problem.  The bigger issue is that the 100-400 is fine for most of the sequence but, at the closest point, it is a bit too much lens.  Still, nice to get one of these again.  No idea what the long term plan is for UPS and the MD-11 but I hope they hang around for a bit.

Chickens

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Chatting with a work colleague recently, we were talking about Molbaks Garden Center in Woodinville which we have visited many times.  She asked if we went to Flower World too and I had to admit I had never heard of it.  It is in Maltby, about ten minutes from home but I had no idea it existed.  It not only is a nursery but it also has a farm with a farm shop.  A visit seemed in order.

There are a lot of chickens at Maltby Farm.  There are a bunch of them roaming the park areas around the garden center.  Within the farm ground, they have a large enclosure full of chickens and the eggs are sold in the shop.  Chickens are interesting creatures since they come in such a wide variety of sizes and plumages.  When the light is right, it really pulls the colors out of the feathers.  They are also amusing to watch with the little battles that break out with surprising regularity.

Life Flight Bell 429

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Life Flight Network operate a lot of movements at Boeing Field.  They have a Bell 429 that is there regularly.  The thing I like about this airframe is that it has a metallic looking paint finish which looks great on a sunny day and can really catch the light.  Here it is heading out on a mission from a while back.

Fishing in the Surf

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I spent a little time at North Head Lighthouse looking back down the beach I had been walking along earlier in the day.  It is a vast area so the people down below were but specks against the sand.  However, one person did catch my eye.  He was fishing in the surf and standing out in the shallows as he cast into the water.  Not sure how successful a location it is for fishing but it didn’t look like the easiest way to catch your dinner!

Uzbekistan Dreamliner Delivery

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Rarity value of Boeing’s production jets is a nice feature of living here.  The 787 line is closing at Everett but there are still plenty of jets to be delivered as a result of some production quality issues.  An Uzbekistan Dreamliner was built last year and I saw its colorful livery on the flight line a while back.  It was finally lined up to depart recently so I decided to watch it go.  It had done some test flying in lovely light in the preceding days but I was unable to be there for that.

The conditions weren’t as nice as they had been previously but they were okay and it did mean that the heat haze which is a big deal at this time of year was not such a factor.  They were departing to the north so came out of the South Gate of the Boeing ramp and taxied to the south end of the field.  A long flight home means plenty of fuel but also no payload so a pretty early rotation.  Even so, managed to get some shots of a jet I am unlikely to see again.

Buzzed By A Bald Eagle

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We had a day out on Whidbey Island and we stopped off at Fort Casey to eat our lunch.  We parked up near the lighthouse and there was a bald eagle hanging around along the cliff tops.  The updrafts made soaring around a piece of cake for it.  It landed in the top of a tree near us as we walked along the cliff.  When we turned around and headed down the slope towards the fort, it started flying high above us and then appeared to swoop down into the bushes – presumably to catch a snack.  We lost track of it at that point but a short while later it emerged from the bushes flying just above head height and straight towards us.  I had the camera on the wrong settings to maximize my chance of getting a good shot but I still managed to get a few slightly blurry ones as it buzzed by.

A220 Engines Look Big Underneath

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The A220 (or C Series as it was then) was the plane that spooked Airbus and then Boeing.  It was an efficient plane with a new engine – the Pratt and Whitney geared turbofan or GTF.  Airbus decided the re-engine the A320 family with a version of the same plane and the success of that project changed Boeing’s plans from a new plane to a reboot of the 737 which gave us the Max!  They went with a different engine to the GTF (and Airbus decided to offer both).  The GTF is a high bypass engine so it takes up a lot of space under the wing.  This A220 passed over me on approach to SeaTac and gave a good idea of just how large the engine nacelles are compared to the rest of the plane.

Mukilteo Rail Station

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In all of my visits to the waterfront at Mukilteo, it would have been neglectful if I hadn’t had a quick poke around at the railroad station.  This is for Sounder commuter rail trains to Seattle and is across from the new ferry terminal.  It will be interesting to see whether WSDOT’s Amtrak Cascades trains stop there in the future to connect with the ferries but currently they do not (and, at the time of writing, the Cascades services north of Seattle are suspended anyway.)

The station is not that old since the Sounder service has only been around since the 2000s.  Consequently, it is a nicely thought out design rather than an old station that has been upgraded.  It includes some artwork with a local theme with stone sculptures of local boat designs.  A footbridge takes you over the tracks to the far platforms.  I doubt I will ever have the need to use it but it was fun to look around on a quiet weekend.

T-34 Low Departure From BFI

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A civilian owned Mentor lives in the Pacific Northwest.  I don’t know which airport is its base as I have seen it flying from a bunch of locations but it is always interesting to catch.  One morning I was up overlooking Boeing Field when it taxied out to depart from the short runway.  It is a small plane for that distance but unusual enough to justify some attention.  They took off quickly but kept it nice and low as they built up speed before climbing away for whatever they had planned.

North Head Lighthouse

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I have already posted shots of a lighthouse from my visit to Cape Disappointment but I did hint in that post that there was a second lighthouse in the area.  This is North Head Lighthouse.  It sits at the end of the beach I walked along.  For a long part of that walk, it was a distant shape on the cliff overlooking the beach.  I finally got close to it and took some less distant shots but this was about the time I realized that some rain was coming my way and a speedy retreat might be in order.

I did think a visit to the lighthouse would be in order before I left so I drove up to the parking lot.  Unfortunately, there was no space to park and I didn’t fancy parking a long way off and walking back in.  However, something was on my side.  It was starting to rain again.  I figured that a lot of the people that had walked out to the lighthouse would be making a retreat for their vehicles.  I drove to an overlook a little north and spent a few minutes there before returning to the parking lot.  Sure enough, it was now a lot less busy and there were spaces everywhere.

It isn’t a long walk out to the lighthouse from the lot.  You go past the house the keeper used to live in and a second property.  I think that they are now available as vacation rentals.  It seems like a cool place to stay but I imagine it feels a lot more remote when everyone has gone and it is dark.  Might be a good spot for astrophotography on a clear night.  (A stormy night might feel a bit more dramatic.)

There was some restoration work underway which meant a few areas with fencing and tape so I made the best of getting them out of the shots.  The lighthouse itself looked in good condition and the view from the headland was very impressive.