Well, the helicopter ride was interesting. It happened because I found what appeared to be a body on the second day of my trip after leaving Edmonton. If it was animal, it was oddly shaped. If it was human, it was a grisley discovery due to the absence of limbs. The circumstances of the discovery indicated major foul play so I eventually reported the discovery to the RCMP in North Battleford, my primary end point, where I chose to end the trip due to fatigue and immense satisfaction at my successes this year. The helicopter was a Bell Ranger outfitted with a heat seeking device that detects heat emitted by organic decomposition and video capabilities. If you look at the picture of the Bell you will see a projection underneath the machine, that is where the detector is located. The chopper ride was very smooth, Cathy is a very capable pilot. I let her know that her flying inspired my confidence. She, uhm, refused to accompany me if I was going to push the issue of giving the Bell a whirl around the city. There are a couple of videos that I took while in flight to give you an idea of what I saw along the way. The search was not successful despite flying from Edmonton to the Alberta/Saskatchewan border. We flew, on average, about 200-250 feet above the river with a forward speed of 60 kmph. Cruising speed of this baby is 110 kmph at 70 % torque, at least that's what we did today. When we got to the Alberta border we landed beside the local Walmart and walked across the parking lot to the A&W for lunch. You should have seen the looks we got as we casually walked away from the Bell and into the A&W. 
The local radio station manager came running over to find out what we were about but we just said local business. Total ride time was about 5 1/2 hours. Man almighty, what a day! That's one item off my list of things to do before I die. After I rest I'll start working on posting my trip report. Incidently, a guy I met along the way suggested that I should create a web page for my big trip so I am thinking about doing just that during the winter. This is turning out to be a pretty interesting gig.
Robert N Pruden
