Okay Wisconsin, let’s do this winter thing.

Yeah! I've never seen that tail ski. It looks like it was adapted from a snow shovel or paint roller tray.

Ha! You're right! It is a paint roller tray!

YeeHaww.....Giddyup, Have a blast

Not to hijack your thread, but in the vein of it being "that time of year": my last flight with the Airstreaks a couple weeks ago. The day before I did some ice skating on the tires on a frozen lake, interspersed with a bit of open water. That's an interesting tail ski you have there!

courierguy wrote:That's an interesting tail ski you have there!

Isn't it, though? I put it on too late in the season last year to see how it works. Looking forward to seeing how it is to operate with a tail ski if it ever snows over here.

http://trickair.com/tailski/

Just got the skis on. Hopefully going to give it a go tomorrow for the first time after I tidy up the brakes and fix the window latch!

I've been on the skis for 2 weeks, and haven't flown once. High cross winds and at times total obscurification, being the reason. Happens every year in my area about this time, a 4 to 6 week stretch of total crap weather, it helps a lot knowing it's normal and will soon give way to clear blue skies and zero winds Locked and loaded!

Flew on skis for the first time yesterday. Had a blast. Got about a hour in and 8 take-offs and landings. I can tell this will be addicting....

Ski flying is simply the most fun you can have in an airplane.......right up till it’s not.

I miss it! Enjoy!

MTV

Unfortunately it's that time of year to take the skis off. Mud season is upon us and we are truly in between seasons. Plenty of snow on the taxiway, not enough on the runway. Since my business is shut down for the foreseeable future due to the virus, at least I will have time to fix all the little things that need attention on the plane.


Pete

The season has come to a close here, it was a good one once it started.

I was working toward my goal of flying into my cabin. I got word that the snow pack in SE Yukon, and particularly near my cabin, is as deep or deeper than its ever been. Consequently, the weight of the snow on lakes and rivers is causing a lot of water to squirt up over the ice, and lay under the snow. The overflow is deep. Add Corona Virus, and I guess that’s it for ski flying this year. Maybe in November I can try again.

Local snow conditions are near nil.

There was a lot of overflow in Ontario, bit of a weird winter overall

My runway, at 5460', is finally dried out, so I can make wheel takeoffs with the Datums. As usual, for a couple weeks during the transition, I didn't have enough snow, or enough (non mushy) ground! Plenty of snow left up higher though, as this pic shows. I still have a couple flights I want to make, involving LZ's up high, then I will call it a season and put the Airstreaks back on. The POV of this pic is from the lower end of the runway, as most probably know by now, a bit over 400' long, but all mine. I could double it's length and then some, but really don't feel the need, flying the S7-S.

Time to put the wheels back on, sigh. Lost the runway over the weekend. Good but odd season. Late snow, then huge warm rain on Christmas Eve melting everything, then pretty good. Got a few more hours than last year and got to some new lakes, so I've got that going for me. It will be at least 2 - 3 weeks until the frost goes out and the runway dries enough to fly. Time to work on a few of those little items that need attention. Fun stuff.

Runway today


Christmas Day. All dressed up with nowhere to go. Only the second or third brown Christmas in my lifetime.


Even got to hang out with the Cub guys, although I don't think they took any pictures of the Champ...


Gotta love the crust


Luckily we have a groomer


Got to land at some new spots


And in less than a month will be relying on this dam for my summer livelihood, running whitewater trips.


Will be back on skis in no time...

Pete

Sounds like I might be one of the few still at it. Very little snow this year, but still about 1.5 feet in the pasture that I use for a runway. I would like to land above 12,000 yet this year, and visit a few private strips. I figure Ive got about 2 weeks before Im done.

Though I could easily still find some high places to land for another month or so, I got my ski flying ticket punched good enough to take the Datums off. I snuck in a freebie a week after the runway had melted off, as a spring storm dumped another 5". BUT, I knew that snow would go quick, and it did, like the same day. I was lucky to pop up on my ramp to the hangar on the side that didn't have bare gravel since my takeoff a few hours earlier (can't see what's up as you taxi up it until you crest it, if I had been thinking I would have eyeballed it before landing, next year...) as shown in the first pic. Then just later in the afternoon, it was 100% gravel, that fast!

I got in what seems to be about my average over the last 10 years, 39 hours, almost exactly 400 hrs. TT of ski flying, all in the mountains, now, so that either means I have it all figured out, or am just learning, probably both To my credit, I haven't been stuck in 5 or 6 years now, I think next winter I'll leave the snowshoes, survival gear, and scoop shovel in the hangar as they are just extra weight, yeah, right. As always, it sure will be nice to have brakes again!

The rocks on one side of this ridge were another sign that it was time to hang it up.https://youtu.be/jGk5rVkGp60

Ski flying came early this year in northern Mn. I put the skis on and flew out of my back yard in my Kitfox 4 on November 14. That is the earliest for ski flying in 20 yrs. Here is a short video of that day. Also, if anyone is interested, the second one is a week or so later flying up a river. JImChuk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5dYJ4nKBlM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7ooo7xCgk0

A couple of days ago. Landed on a lake near Park Rapids, MN.