Last week I was invited to join some cub friends on a trip from Texas to the mountains of Arkansas. A couple of days before we were to leave the SQ-2 went down for maintenance so I took the 185 instead. Thus began about 20 hours of slow flight, keeping up with the cubs. Bottom of the green for throttle and prop, and one notch of flaps - and a lot of 60 to 70 mph flying.

First stop was Scot Warren's place just northeast of Dallas where he'd join us. After a quick lunch and fuel, we headed for Arkansas. Or rather the two cubs did. I sat on the ground for about 20 minutes hoping to save most of the slow flight for Arkansas. It wasn't long before I caught up with them and found myself doing turns around a point and s-turns. As we crossed the Red River I dropped down to land a couple of sand bars.

A while later we got to that part on the sectional that warns of rapidly rising terrain.


A few hours later we arrived over Byrd's Adventure Center where the 25th Annual Rocktober Festival was underway. Below us were hundreds of Rock Crawlers and their owners and families. Byrd's has two grass strips; a short one with power lines at both ends, and a longer one. We dropped in, were met by the owner and got a quick tour, and then headed to another strip close by.

About 850 feet long, off camber, landing uphill into the wind, taking off downhill with the wind. This would be home for the weekend.



We grabbed one of the cars that was left for us and headed to the lodge.


The following morning we awoke to a beautiful sight of the valleys below filled with fog. This was the case every morning.


A short time later the Katmai's started to arrive.


After breakfast we headed off to get fuel and fly back over to Byrd's.



A few of the rock crawlers came over to watch us land.


We were then invited to go rock crawling. We climbed into jeeps and off we went.



For competition they have two classes, little tires and big tires. These are the little tires.


Hey guys get out of the way, we're backcountry pilots here, you're standing on the road.


A highway



If these guys were pilots, they'd fly big tire planes for sure.



All too soon we were back at Byrd's new restaurant, with 5 star food. The owners came out to greet us.


Seems like we could only stay on the ground for a short time, then it was time to fly the river.


There is always a show off in the bunch.


After a day of fun it was time for a group photo in front of the restaurant before we headed out.


The next morning we headed out again.


First stop was Gastons for fuel and lunch.



After lunch it was off to lemonade and cookies at an off-camber saddle strip.

That night we were invited to a hangar party at yet another grass strip, barbecue chicken and all the fix in's with live music.

Next morning it was time to head home. I'd had all the slow flight I wanted, so launched alone, ahhh, finally, 150 mph.

We all had an absolute blast on this trip, ate some fantastic food, flew some beautiful country, land some fun strips - uphill, downhill, saddles, and almost all off camber. Good times for sure.

Excellent trip report Phil. Two of those Carbon Cubs look familiar. Was that Joe (with the smoke) and TC?

That place looks like a great destination. Who knew it. Pretty spot!

Ar-Kansas!

Crzyivan13 wrote:...Two of those Carbon Cubs look familiar. Was that Joe (with the smoke) and TC?

That place looks like a great destination. Who knew it. Pretty spot!

Ar-Kansas!

The smoke was Chuck from Florida, the blue one Scot, and the gray one Steve's.

Like you said... who knew? And so close. Lots and lots of non-standard grass strips. And on the way, the Red River, a huge big tire play ground.

Nice TR, Phil!

I think the Ozarks are too often overlooked, and way under-rated. Some really pretty country down there, especially in the late fall when the bugs aren't too bad and it's not too hot. We used to float the Buffalo River every spring when the water was running high, camping several days on the way down.

CapnMike wrote:...We used to float the Buffalo River every spring when the water was running high, camping several days on the way down.

We were based in the Ponca area. You ever eat at the Low Gap Cafe? Five star food from the most unlikely place.

I think Byrds is where this was filmed.

https://www.backcountrypilot.org/forum/hot-girls-and-a-husky-13629

Barnstormer wrote:

CapnMike wrote:...We used to float the Buffalo River every spring when the water was running high, camping several days on the way down.

We were based in the Ponca area. You ever eat at the Low Gap Cafe? Five star food from the most unlikely place.

Heh - we were all about hot dogs and hamburgers and cases of cheap beer... The only gourmet place we stopped was 7-Eleven!

Crzyivan13 wrote:I think Byrds is where this was filmed.

https://www.backcountrypilot.org/forum/hot-girls-and-a-husky-13629

How right you are. I have to say I didn't see any girls that looked like that at Rocktoberfest.

My new friend Chuck put this video together of our trip. Although a couple of pics of me are in the video the 185 is noticeably missing. When questioned Chuck said "All my shots of your plane were terrible blurry!". Really?

I think he was just embarrassed I was taking the 185 everywhere he went - well - almost everywhere.

Yah, I gave him crap about how to spell "International".

Looks like a fun time. I like the footage about 3:40ish of someone waterskiing and you can see the weeds under the water because it's so clear!

CW