You boys have fun. Sorry I'm going to miss this one. Heading to Key West today for some fly fishing (okay well a wedding - but I'm going to fish).

Aeropod, sorry to hear about your dog. Hope he's on the mend and feels better soon. Let's try and get together some locals in a couple of weeks here. I really want a ride in your SQ2.

Pup is doing well and dad is trying to talk me into an early trip down in the morning...

Once again, another great fly-in at LGCR. Mike has the place looking fantastic and the valley was beautiful after all the recent rain. Weather was certainly a concern throughout the weekend, but we still ended up with about 25 planes.

I snapped this picture of Pikes Peak on my way over. This was at 7am, and you know it's going to be a wet day when you see this stuff developing already.


Bearhawk (which we all named the PolarBear) at Saguache.


I think we had about 10 planes enjoy the views at Quarter Circle Circle.


Flying formation over to Hooper


I didn't count, but I bet there were over 15 planes at Hooper for lunch. The new adults only pool is top notch. Always a treat to visit the Sand Dunes Pool for food and a soak.


Skaly departing Hooper with his new MT pulling hard.


185 landing back at La Garita


Incredible detail on this Bearhawk


The skies to the west turned dark, and it appeared we were going to get a little rain.


An impressive line came through shortly thereafter, which had us all running for cover.


We had an impromptu spot landing contest, followed by dinner. The evening was wonderful with clear skies.


Sunday morning was CAVU and the sun lit up the runway with vibrant color.


Hope everyone had a safe flight home. I can't wait to see everyone at the next one!

MM

Great pics, Matt. I love the one of Skalywag running for cover. Ha!

Who owns the Polarbear? Is he on here?

Looks great Matt. Work and a tornado nixed the trip this time. I'm looking forward to a trip a bit later.

Zzz wrote:Who owns the Polarbear? Is he on here?

Yep, goes by "Pinyon" on here. It's the lightest 540 Bearhawk (I believe) and it's a monster!

Nice pics MM. It was a great weekend, pity about the weather keeping some folks away but that's part of the deal.
Good flying, good food and fun story telling around the fire by the 'Flugtag' boys!
On the way home, the 'polarbearhawk' and I went to Quarter Circle again and had fun flying around the high country.

Thanks to all that make these events possible. See you at the next one.
RR

Thanks again to Matt, Alec, Mike and everyone else who had a hand in putting this together. La Garita Creek Ranch is such a beautiful place. It was really fun to fly with some new folks, see y'all next time.

Great pictures guys, thanks for posting. Hopefully next year!

Bill

Dang that looks like fun. I never seem make it over there all the way from here in Salida. Maybe next year! What do you guys think of a 150 getting in and out of there? It takes me a thousand feet or so to get off when the DAs are 9.5-10k here depending on winds.

We had a beautiful Cessna 150TW w/150HP come up from AZ and he had no issues with the airstrip. I don't think a stock 150 would fair well unless in the most ideal conditions (cold temps and a good headwind). An east takeoff would be required and the winds rarely blow from the east.

But, plenty of great airports nearby suitable for the 150 (Leach and Del Norte). A shuttle to get you to the ranch/fly-in is no problem for anyone with hesitation.

I had a great time again, too. That squall did a number on a couple of my tent poles, which need repairing, but otherwise everything fared well. Ol' Molly dog and I stayed over Sunday night, and wonder of wonders, at about 1:30 in the afternoon, actually had a light headwind taking off downhill into the valley!

As soon as I get around to transferring pix onto the computer, I'll post some, too. Trying to follow Matt's lead in the picture taking business is impossible, but I did better this time than most times past.

On a 150 going in and out, I wouldn't try it myself in a stock 150. Light with a 125hp conversion, maybe; with a 150hp conversion, sure. But DA daily is close to 10,000', and although 150s can certainly top out at a higher altitude than that, they're pretty anemic.

It is a delightful place. Now if Mike and Collette can just figure out a way to cut the wind down, it would be tremendous!

Cary

Here are some pics I took after most of the participants had left:

She took off:




Then he took off:




Then they formed up and came around to do this, much closer formation than I would dare to do (not criticizing them--I'm not that good):




Some of the cabins are pretty unique, although mostly Molly wasn't all that interested in them--although she did explore the back porch on this one later:






The scenery is beautiful, looking across the Valley:




My ol' Molly dog loves the place--in fact, as I was finally packing the airplane to leave, she disappeared, and I found her where I expected to, on the porch of the lodge--same thing happened last year.




Although things are pretty green this year so far, there aren't many flowers. This guy looked like the "lonely little petunia in an onion patch" (that's a poem from my childhood):




Storm clouds built again, and there were some light sprinkles, but nothing like the storm that had blown in on Saturday:




I call this "the gate to nowhere", as the path goes through the gate, up the hill a few feet, and just stops. On of my favorite poems is Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken", but first there has to be a road!




Looks a bit forlorn out there with no one else around, right?




But the sunset was pretty, and the weather remained good overnight--just a little breeze:




In the morning, Molly preferred to be in the shade from the morning sun--not warm yet, but really bright:




The moon shone brightly in the morning--at 10:38 a.m.:




We wandered to the west end of the airstrip for the last reconnoiter before taking off, packed up, and took off about 1:30. Mike came over as I was packing up, we chatted a bit, and he reminded me that the next La Garita Fly-in will be in August--y'all come!

Cary

Thanks for the pictures Cary. The gate to nowhere actually goes somewhere. It you keep going up the hill a few hundred feet it turns into an old jeep road, follow that jeep road about a mile north and it intersects with some sweet single track in Penitente canyon.
I rode about 15 miles of it on Friday, it was so good that I did it again on Saturday!

The moral of the story? All roads eventually lead to someplace!

Great pictures and report Cary. We hope to see everyone in Aug at the next one.