I fly Light Sport Delta Wing Trikes and have spent the last two years travelling the southwest and camping at remote strips while flying the overweight but now legal ultralight from these areas. I have done this at Shiprock, Monument Valley, Pagosa Springs, Marble Canyon, Magdelena, some farmers fields, and off the beach at the Salton Sea in California, just to name a few.

I have spent some time in Southern Utah and wanted to trailer to the Needles Outpost, set up camp and fly from their field this memorial day weekend. I was rebuked and am now looking for suggestions for an alternate. Any Ideas where a person might find a place like this in southeastern Utah?

Thanks for any input,
John

If you come a little farther to Idaho they have some. I don't think they are clear of snow yet however. Johnson creek (3U2) listed under Yellow Pine in the AOPA directory. Big Creek (U60) I know it won't be open yet. Warm Springs (0U1) and Smiley Creek (U87). There is a road that goes by all of these strips when the snow permits.

John,

Nice to have some ultralight flyers on the site...seems like we haven't had any for a while. I think the trikes are really neat aircraft, and almost envy that you can fit them in a trailer. I've flown Quicksilver MXL's for a number of years, and you have to do 55 mph with the wind in your face to get wherever you're going.

Check out Galen Hanselman's Fly Utah! guide book. I've been meaning to write a review on it as soon as I get some time, but it's a great resource and packs easily as it's a small format book.

Keep watching your thread...there lots of southwest guys on this site.

Also, look through the airstrip list on the UBCP website. On that page they have a Google Earth KMZ file that will overlay the airstrips on the satellite photo for you. Pretty cool.

Hi John

I think that I have enjoyed watching some of your videos. I live in Durango, and fly the SE Utah area quite a bit.

Depending on how much driving you want to do, I can give you a few places. One of the best would probably be Tangri-la, down the river from Moab.

Nokai Dome would be a great place to camp, and fly out of.

Mexican Hat,Monuement Valley, and Bluff would all be very easy to base out of. You can drive down to Mineral Canyon. Lot of good strips near there, and water.

Like suggested, get Galens book, and map. Those will show and tell you alot.

It's a great area for exploring. Very hot in the hot in the summer. I prefer spring and fall.

Have fun Gary

Tangri La is closed. I flew over it last weekend and there were obstacles put all over the runway. It is a private airstrip so they can do what they want there.

Needles Outpost is in a similar position. It is privately leased and at the moment the lease owners do not welcome airplanes.

I have seen lots of trikes out at Ibex but it might be farther west than you are interested in going. Its advantage is that since it is a dry lake bed you can always land into the wind and drive your vehicle to where ever you need to for ease of operations.

Mineral Canyon does have a road going to it but it is a steep, switchbacked dirt road that you may not feel comfortable bringing a trailer on. Some people get nervous there even with out a trailer.

Another location you might want to consider would be Fry Canyon. It has very easy road access, nice hiking, Indian ruins and slot canyons One of the canyons requires rappelling into the water and swimming a short distance before continuing on with the hike.

shortfielder wrote:Hi John

I think that I have enjoyed watching some of your videos.

What videos are you talking about? Where can we find these?

You sure you wanna see them? I hear they involved burros, black socks, & a mask.......

So what's this about Needles not welcoming airplanes? Are Gary and Tracy still the oweners? I know Tracy can be nice one day and a bitch the next. Fill us in on what the story is there.

Referring to the original post, tell us about being "rebuked".

The strip had a lot of erosion about a year and a half ago, There are some pretty deep ruts on it. I think there are places where you could use it, but they haven't done anything to fix it. I think they may have X's on it now.

Seems pretty obvious they don't care about pilots.

Such a shame. Pretty cool spot, and good b'fasts, and shakes.

Gary

Was over Needles Outpost 2 days ago. Called ahead and was told the airstrip has been closed for 2 years and is not landable, sorry. Was in the area, so flew over the strip anyway. There are definitely landable areas, but they do have an X and did not seem interested in the land at your own risk stance.

That is too bad. When Tracy and Gary first moved there, they were really cool and welcoming. We used to go down there for Spring Break.

Redtail or someone was running sightseeing flights out of there. It seems that they are ignoring something that would only inhance their business. I know that they had a bad wash out some years ago and it sounds like some more last year. It would be interesting to know what has changed their attitude towards the strip.

I always thought that Gary was a good guy, and good cook. Tracey is just Tracey, but seems she kinda runs things. I sure wish that they could be replaced by someone that was a little more pilot friendly. That would be a great place to base out of.

Gary

Thanks for the info on the Utah airstrips book. I have already downloaded the Google Earth airstrip file. The "rebuke" from Tracy at Needles was more like a "Don't even THINK of landing here" response to my question about weather there was a usable length of 300 feet left on the runway.

The website for my videos is:
http://www.social.trikepilot.com/video/ ... ame=skyguy

Lots of heavily edited videos of me and my fellow trikers flying all over the southwest. The Aussie who does most of the filming and narrates is flying what we call a stick trike. Not much to it. But he can land it across a 50 ft wide runway without running off the side.

There are 4 to 7 of us who will trailer to a great field or playa and set up camp in the toybox travel trailers. We usually camp for 5 to 7 days and do mostly morning and evening flights. During the day we ride motorcycles, snooze, eat, snooze some more and get ready for the evening flights.

I have been looking at Happy Canyon, Mineral Bottom, and a place I used to camp while riding bikes in Kane Creek Canyon. The road there is flat down by the split and there are lots of camping areas.
I don't know if anyone has tried landing on the gravel road in Kane creek canyon parallel with Tangri-La but it is pretty open at that point in the canyon.

I welcome all suggestions and look forward to maybe meeting some of you guys at future fly-ins.
John