Low Approach at Moses Lake WA 

I live close to that airport, and have driven by it many a time. Cost of living is overall fairly low, but Moses doesn't have a ton of places to go/do things compared even to Wenatchee. But seems like a good place to be for fliers. Many commercial pilots have trained at least in part out of Grant County International, and Mitsubishi did a lot of it's flight testing on it's regional jet (mostly the US Certification work) there when that project was still active. Not a lot of flights into or out of the airport, very quiet airspace compared to anywhere near SeaTac or any major city. Some light Air Force activity, probably training, on C17s and C130s.

It's true that the weather east of the Cascades is typically better (i.e., more often VMC) than on the west side. But places like Moses Lake, Pasco, Yakima, and Spokane are also much hotter in the summer and much colder in the winter. Flying is certainly less complicated, given the wide open spaces and simple airspace. You don't even need ADS-B out to operate in most of the area, save the Class C around Spokane.

@@BruceAirFlying Weather around Moses Lake is basically "San Diego weather, add 10 degrees to each end of the temp range". Very similar precipitation (and Moses is kinda HIGH on that due to the lake effect, most of the area is dryer). And no Southern California crazy degree of overcrowding! I spent 12 years in the San Diego area - I miss the climate.

I did all of my student flying out of Spokane, where I went to high school, and during college, I flew from Walla Walla. I enjoy the relatively uncrowded skies, simple airspace, and more opportunities to fly in VMC. But summers and winters can be brutal.

@@BruceAirFlying I spent 17 years in Iowa. THAT was brutal winters. Last summer was nasty here though.