The glory of float plane flying.

You know, many times float plane flying is pretty glorious. I mean, who gets to take off and land on small rivers and worry about hitting logs, dugout canoes, or other floating objects during their day to day job?

However, come dry season, the game changes. Just this past week I brought a medical team to a Shipibo indian village called Caimeto, about 25 minutes away. Caimito is a lake and the water lever rises and fall just like it does in the rivers. So in dry season the lake is lower than it is during rainy season. All that to say, sometimes you run aground before getting to dry land. And sometimes you have to get wet! I had to get into the water and push the plane around for both docking and undocking.

My shoes did stay dry though as I took them off before jumping into the water. A few small kids tried to help push as well, expending more effort making faces than pushing I think...

So, here is a parting shot of the "glorious" float plane pilot, barefoot and wet from the waist down, flying back to base.