Rumor has it there will be pylons. Not that I'd know anything about that.

You guys missed a fantastic week of Ozarks Backcountry flying and competition (and a day of fishing).

It began Monday when Steve and I left Spicewood Texas for Ponca Arkansas. Along the way we linked up with Scot. With all the rain that’s been happening this month in Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas, all the rivers were out of banks, which meant no gravel bar fun on the way up. Bummer. Six and a half hours later we landed at Byrd’s Adventure Center on one of Zen’s Ultralight oneway strips. We spent the night in the Hillbilly Hilton, and aptly named doublewide. Even so Zen is a fantastic host.

Tuesday we left to begin scouting private strips for the fly-in later in the week. Night found us at the Buffalo River Lodge cabins and the private strip atop a mountain, which are accommodations more in my liking.


Wednesday was some more scouting on our way to Gaston’s White River Resort, our home for the remainder of the week and the location for the STOL competition.
http://www.gastons.com


Thursday we all took a day off from flying and went fishing. I’ve been wanting to fly-fish the White River for a long time so while everyone else hopped in the river boats to throw spinning gear, I waited for my guide, Steve Dally of Dally’s Ozark Fly Fisher.
http://theozarkflyfisher.com

Have to admit I was disappointed when he arrived with a regular river boat instead of a drift boat. We launched and he immediately had engine troubles after just picking the boat up from his mechanic the night before. I caught a couple of browns while he struggled. Being a former fishing guide myself I was curious how he’d handle this. After probably 45 minutes of fighting the engine he announced he’d just charge me a half day rate and we’d go to his house and get his other boat. I was fine with that. An hour and half later we were back in the water, this time in a drift boat - yea! It did have a 6hp outboard for moving through the unproductive waters. Eventually 5 o’clock rolled around and I’d caught and released probably 60 to 70 rainbows, no big fish, but good eating size - except I don’t eat fish - can’t stand the smelly things. He’d busted his ass and saved the day. Had a great time and wore my ass out. He was relieved I was happy and told me he was ready to fish me till dark if necessary. I paid him for a full day with a generous tip. That night Gaston’s cooked up everyone’s trout while I ordered a shrimp pasta dinner - hey at least they swim around like fish.

While we were out fishing other airplanes/pilots started to arrive, including our Air Boss Jimmy and his wife Sally in their new 180.


Friday morning it was off to take everyone to some of the strips we’d scouted. A handful of us were experienced with backcountry strips, but most were new at it.

Some strips were moderately easy, some not so much. A lot were one-ways and landed uphill with a tailwind. Some also were side sloped and some had saddles. The one enjoyed most I suspect was a steep uphill strip that began with a turn on final plus an obstacle clearance. The lower part of the strip was the steepest which would not tolerate a flare on landing and required half throttle or better to proceed to the second, less steep portion of the strip. Everyone in the group pulled it off.


Late afternoon found us back at Gaston’s for the first day of STOL competition. The Obstacle STOL was a huge hit, and just like at this year’s Texas STOL Roundup it was a hoot to watch when not flying. Plenty of non-pilot spectators were on hand enjoying the spectacle. The Obstacle event was followed by a traditional STOL event.

Dinner was Barbecue cooked up by Gaston’s accompanied by an excellent live three piece band. The music continued late into the night.


Saturday we headed out to private strips, greeted with cookies at one, while Scot, Chuck and myself headed to a close by one-way ultralight strip set down in the trees. Landing was all down hill immediately after clearing the trees. Always fun to try and land a plane on a strip that falls away from you, especially when its a short one-way with an obstacle approach.


Lunch found us at another one-way high atop a mountain on the edge of a cliff, with a tail wind. One of our pilots came in high and hot, landed long, and went barreling to the end of the strip, turned left at the end, and disappeared behind the trees. We thought for certain we’d find a plane with its wings torn off, but no, around the corner was the front yard of the strip’s owner with a plane on it. It seems there is no approach too bad that it can’t be salvaged.


We all boarded an Army surplus 5-ton (I think) and headed to the Low Gap Cafe for lunch. Afterwards it was back to Gaston’s for another round of STOL competition culminating with flour bombing.


Another Barbecue dinner with the same great band long into the night.


Sunday was scheduled to be another play day but the weather in Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas was getting nasty quick. Jimmy and Sally were one of the first to depart in their 180 but returned shortly to say the tops of the rocks were in the clouds. We all spent the next few hours looking at our weather apps, hoping that someone had an app that indicated good weather, but alas, they all showed the same thing - bad getting worse.

Late morning came with what looked like maybe a high enough ceiling to get over the rocks. Headwind from the ground on up of 30 to 35. The Gist’s and I decided to head for Texas. The meanest, wettest storm in a long time stretched from the Gulf of Mexico to Wisconsin (or somewhere up there) with no breaks. There was no way we’d make it all the way home so after phone calls to various airports looking for transient hangar space to protect the planes, Arkadelphia was our destination. The race between the Tortoise (SQ2) and the Hare (180) was on!

The Tortoise left first and gained a small but temporary advantage. In short order the hare came flying by and was well on its way. The hare did provide advanced recon for upcoming areas of turbulence, which was pretty much through the entire mountain area of Arkansas. The hare arrived in Arkadelphia well in advance of the tortoise and secured hangar space for both. As the tortoise arrived so did a tornado warning followed by rain.

The young man running the FBO was a student pilot. After a bit another young man arrived who was planning on studying for his upcoming CFI exam in the morning. It was painfully clear that we were quickly becoming a bad influence on this pair so when the tornado and its weather passed we decided to push on. This time to Henderson Texas. Jimmy made a quick call to a friend who lived there to get us hangar accommodations again and the race was back on, but not before the SQ-2 introduced these two young men to STOL.

As we flew on I couldn’t help but notice that the entire forested area was inundated with water, what an huge mosquito breeding ground this will be.

Once again the hare arrived first with the tortoise landing just in time for another tornado warning. The tortoise was hangared and we were off to dinner with our airport host and his family. After which we grabbed a couple of hotel rooms for the night.

Next morning dawned just like the others before. MVFR conditions at best, but forecast to get worse as the day went on so we grabbed a quick breakfast and off we went on our final leg. For a while the tortoise was in the lead, but before long radio communications indicated the hare was coming fast. For the first time we were on slightly different courses as the tortoise was headed for Spicewood and the hare for Llano. Visibility was the poorest it had been so the tortoise and the hare never saw each other but kept track of each others progress over radio.

The hare only needed an hour and a half to reach its destination, the tortoise three. Just when the tortoise thought all hope was lost the hare had to land prematurely and take shelter under a hail shed. The tortoise pushed on as the severe weather did its best to arrive first.

The tortoise skirted the storm just staying out of the rain. As it flew over Lake Travis the evidence of the month’s storm’s power was immediately evident. Debris, boats and docks were floating free everywhere in the lake, even entire marinas were adrift.

As the tortoise landed and was put in the hangar, a text message was received from the hare - once again, the tortoise had beaten the hare.

And true to form, in short order rain of epic proportions and tornado warnings.


What a great trip!

P.S. Nice to have the rain, ending our 10+ year drought, but all my local SQ-2 playground is now underwater till the next prolonged drought. Bummer.

Great trip report, photos and video! Do you have any images of the STOL obstacle clearance contest coming? How was that set up? I stopped at Gaston's when I flew my plane from Virginia to Washington State and that area looked like a great playground. I was heavily loaded and on a schedule though, so didn't get to poke around as much as I would have liked. Not that I would have made it anyway, but I don't remember seeing any advanced notice of this gathering. it must have been out there, and I just didn't notice. The short video of planes departing for the strip bagging tour indicates you had a pretty good turnout.

We've got a Dropbox folder set up and everyone is still uploading images and videos. Once that's done I'll compile a video and post some additional photos. The Obstacle STOL was done the same way we did it at the Texas STOL Roundup.
http://www.texasstolroundup.org/past_events.html

This event didn't get the pre-exposure the Texas STOL Roundup did, and that was intentional. It started out a few years ago as just a CarbonCub fly-in, they hybridized with the OK18 Fly-in when that temporarily halted due to the organizers health (the OK18 is back on its own now). This year I was invited into the organization of the Ozark Backcountry Fly-In and asked to supply the Obstacle STOL.

Can't wait to attend this event, had to work this year

Looks like a good time!

Flyhound wrote:...Do you have any images of the STOL obstacle clearance contest coming?...

Here is a quick edit from video shot from my plane.