June 5, 2020 - June 7, 2020 — Smiley Creek Idaho

First Idaho Gathering of Straight-Tail 182 Owners - 1956-1959!
- Camping available Friday and Saturday nights. Optional motel rooms at the Smiley Creek Lodge a short walk across the highway. Reservations required.
- Bring your own meals or eat at the Smiley Creek Lodge restaurant.
- If you plan to attend, write to Phil (info below) with your group size for planning purposes and to receive any last minute details about the event and other information about the area.
-Fly-Outs to other backcountry airstrips will be at the pilots discretion and depend on runway conditions at the higher elevation strips based on snow melt and weather.
-Strongly suggest purchasing Galen Hanselman’s book Fly Idaho which details the Idaho backcountry network.
Contact for more information:
Philip Ackerman
208-871-8520
[email protected]

Ummmm, Smiley Creek IS one of the highest runways in Idaho......7206 msl.

Beautiful airport, however.

MTV

Sounds fun, putting it on the calendar!

Can I come if I bring a stool to raise the tail wheel and lower the nose while parked?

mtv wrote:Ummmm, Smiley Creek IS one of the highest runways in Idaho......7206 msl.

Beautiful airport, however.

MTV

It will be a tit bit nipply

Will 182's with the incorrect tail be booed off the airfield?

qmdv wrote:
It will be a tit bit nipply

Is that a Naval term?

The Glastar group held their annual Smiley Creek fly-in third week June last year. I monitored the webcam from my warm home and witnessed blustery and snowy conditions much of the weekend. It appeared that they all toughed it out. Certainly straight tail 182 owners are up to that sort of weather camping challenge, yeah? Also, I would hope that non-nosewheel straight tails and slant tail 182’s would be welcome, or at least tolerated. Subject to ribbing that beer could help abate, likely.

daedaluscan wrote:

qmdv wrote:
It will be a tit bit nipply

Is that a Naval term?

LOL! It means it'll be cold.....so cold in fact that one's nipples are hard.

Can not make it this year due to a serious horseback riding accident. Recovering from my injuries now.

Enjoy and bring a warm sleeping bag and catch you next year!

Dave

****** Straight-Tail Cessna 182 Fly-In at Smiley Creek, Idaho ******

The good news is we’re still on schedule for the Fly-In on the weekend of June 5-7. The runway is free of snow and should green up nicely over the next few weeks. A couple reminders...If you haven’t already, make sure you review the procedures for Smiley Creek which can be found at the Idaho Division of Aeronautics website...itd.idaho.gov. Under the Idaho Airports tab there’s an IAA link to Idaho Airports. Click on that and then on Smiley Creek. Probably be a good idea to print out those procedures. For those of you not interested in camping, call the Smiley Creek Lodge for room or yurt reservations. They don’t have many. I’m not sure what they have left. Also, the manager of the lodge is interested in hosting a fixed-price barbecue on Saturday evening if there’s enough interest. I haven’t got a menu for that yet but anyone who is interested let me know by text or Email in the next couple weeks and I’ll get more details.

As for the facilities at SC...there are two free showers, four flushing toilets and Internet service. There is also a place to charge devices. Also, there is a donation box to pay what you feel is fair per night...cash encouraged. This year there are two Chevy Impalas available to rent. The state used to supply firewood on request, but no longer. I’ll have friends in the area and I’ll see whatI can come up with. I think there is one main fire pit. I’ll check with the caretaker at the end of the month to see if we can get a self-supporting large coffee pot. The caretakers arrive on June 1.

I’m working on some ideas for a T-shirt and I’ll try to have some graphic samples with me. Something like “First Annual Straight-Tail 182 Fly-In - Smiley Creek, Idaho along with a graphic. If anyone has cool photos of their plane in flight that we can consider to add along with a mountain/runway scene, please Email them to me. Your plane may get immortalized on cotton.

There are no scheduled activities except the possibility of a barbecue on Sat evening. I imagine that many will want to fly out on Sat or Sun AM’s to some of the other backcountry strips. There are lodges that should be serving breakfast by then. A few are Sulfur Creek, Big Creek, Root Ranch and maybe others. Each Lodge should be contacted ahead of time for reservations. Carey, ID (U65) is having their annual Fly-In pancake breakfast on Sat AM and that may be of interest. $5 per person. Carey is 50 mi SE of Smiley Creek. I planned this event as early as possible in the season for density altitude considerations. Nights should be cool, high 30’s and low 40’s with daytime temps in the 55-65 deg range. At a runway elevation of 7200 ft, it doesn’t have to get very warm for the DA to get up in the 8-10,000 ft range. The runway is generally smooth and just fine for “nosedraggers”.

If anyone has any questions, please call or Email me. I have 30 names of 182 pilots who showed interest initially in attending. Two of them from as far away as Lake Havasu City and Tucson. It should be a great event and I imagine after the last few months people are really looking for someplace to gather with their plane.

For Onthegas1

Of course! You guys who pay high insurance premiums are certainly welcome!

No boos from my group!

I happened to be camping at Alturas on a weekend there was a fly-in at Smiley Creek. Be smart and don’t fly directly over Alturas, Petit or Redfish because there are hundreds of people camping there that will not appreciate your 7am wake up call. It was seriously obnoxious - a plane overhead seemingly every 30 seconds on an otherwise pristine mountain morning. It was one of the experiences that made me so sour on backcountry etiquette (that and getting shot at by some pilots and the 5-ship carbon cub air show and the practice takeoffs and landings in the Frank at 7am, all within about 7 days of each other).

FWIW, Alturas is the big ass lake on the other side of the most obvious pass coming up the canyon on a straight line from Boise to Smiley Creek (basically Boise > Atlanta > Smiley Creek takes you right over Alturas. Try not to do that.

skiermanmike wrote:I happened to be camping at Alturas on a weekend there was a fly-in at Smiley Creek. Be smart and don’t fly directly over Alturas, Petit or Redfish because there are hundreds of people camping there that will not appreciate your 7am wake up call. It was seriously obnoxious - a plane overhead seemingly every 30 seconds on an otherwise pristine mountain morning. It was one of the experiences that made me so sour on backcountry etiquette (that and getting shot at by some pilots and the 5-ship carbon cub air show and the practice takeoffs and landings in the Frank at 7am, all within about 7 days of each other).

FWIW, Alturas is the big ass lake on the other side of the most obvious pass coming up the canyon on a straight line from Boise to Smiley Creek (basically Boise > Atlanta > Smiley Creek takes you right over Alturas. Try not to do that.

Mr congeniality has spoken

Boo hoo, squirrel hunter. I said right in the post I’m pretty sour on the lack of backcountry etiquette. You might know a few reasons why.

Well, I agree with some of what you said. The 7:00 AM wake up by dozens of pilots can be obnoxious if you’re not a pilot. Most of us love airplane noise, even if it is an alarm clock.

As for the location of Alturas Lake...to your dislike it is directly East of the lowest route from Boise to Smiley Creek. It’s also the safest route in a pretty unforgiving environment with 4 airstrips along the way that could be used in an emergency...Graham, Weatherby, and 2 strips in Atlanta. The good news is that before most pilots get to Alturas they will be throttling back for the descent into Smiley Creek. On Sunday AM when people start leaving many will want to go back toward Boise and be climbing out over Alturas. This year the Forest Service campgrounds are closed until June 5. Aircraft will no doubt arrive at Smiley Creek on the 4th and after and stay thru the weekend with lots of flying going on. Lots of campgrounds out there nowhere near any runway. I’ll put out the word to be polite.

BTW...Sulfur Creek Ranch just put out a note about their operations this year. Anyone thinking about visiting them for a meal should take a look at it. It’s on the Cessna-182 Skylane page, Straight Tail Cessnas and Airplane Camping.

Yes, this is the point I’m making - that lake is directly under the most obvious, lowest, “directest” route between Boise and Smiley Creek - it’s not to the east of the route, it *is* the route. And if you’re coming up from the west you pop over the ridge and if you don’t know it in advance, suddenly you’re over hundreds of campers.

This is why I bring it up, because if you go the easy way you’ll be right over it - you have to actively avoid it. Sitting there on the ground with a cup of coffee while 80 airplanes buzz overhead is a real wake up call. It’s like “oh, wow, now I understand why they hate us!”

By the way, one other thought - I know everyone likes to hate on me and I admit I’m a prickly bastard about this stuff, but I’m not haranguing everyone on the noise issue because I am worried about me. It’s not like I’m going to camp at Alturas that weekend and want to make sure there are no planes flying over. It’s that we fly over those campgrounds and abuse our privileges in the wilderness at our own peril. There is nothing like a fly-in with unaware pilots coming from all over to buzz around the wilderness not understanding how hot this issue is locally, to get all those other interest groups and the Forest Service hot and bothered about restricting access to airstrips all over the state. Just sayin... being a good neighbor is good for everyone.

BirdyinBOI wrote:BTW...Sulfur Creek Ranch just put out a note about their operations this year. Anyone thinking about visiting them for a meal should take a look at it. It’s on the Cessna-182 Skylane page, Straight Tail Cessnas and Airplane Camping.

Yes, but also note that this year, they are requiring breakfast reservations prior to arrival. So, don't expect to just drop in and have breakfast, as in past.

Great place, best breakfast around...

MTV