RanchPilot, great video as always! The Winds are pretty damn cool, I'd say some of the deepest wilderness in the upper 48.
I took my girlfriend camping at Tokatee State down by the Umpqua for the weekend. We got picked up by a friend on Saturday to go out to breakfast and then go climbing nearby. It was great since hes a FS employee so he had a key to the runway gate so we didn't have to walk the extra mile to his truck
I'm amazed more people don't camp at Tokatee State, your miles from the highway, other than my friend we didn't see a single other car or person. Lots of turkey and elk though. The camping is prime, with a picnic table and a fire ring. I cleaned up the tie-downs a little bit and put some tires over them to make em a little more obvious. One has chains, the other two have older rope, might be wise to carry your own. You could have a couple of camps dispersed along the south side of the runway and you wouldn't know the others where there.
The strip is in pretty good shape with the first 1,500' of each end being nice grass, then the middle gets a little more rutted from the elk grazing. My friend said the FS does actually try and maintain the strip. We walked the strip and cleared what little debris was there. There was a nice chewed up animal carcass hiding in the grass on the west end strip, some of those sharp bones probably could have done some decent tire damage. Especially to a wanna-be like me in a 172 with stock tires.
If you go to Tokatee and notice all the wood stacks along the north side of the strip, that's a FS project where they are mimicking how they make charcoal for whiskey with the hopes the charcoal will actually add nutrients to the soil unlike their normal slash piles.
We camped at the east end near the airport register, which had only 12 entry's since 7/2010... Go check it out! McKenzie Bridge is fun for the slight challenge of landing there, but the camping at Tokatee is a lot nicer. BCP get-together some day?
If anyone has noticed the sweet 2000' paved strip at Illahee Flats along the Umpqua, I asked about it at the Dry Creek Store since its not charted or listed on airnav.com and found out its for sale for a cool $4,000,000, just dropped down from $5,000,000... Time to start saving!
Here is a video I made when I took my friend for a short flight to go look at some rock climbing areas with a quick landing in Prospect on Saturday morning.
Cheers!


Forgot to mention we did a little target practice


Breakfast @ Steamboat Inn


Went climbing here Saturday afternoon. McKinley Rock, lots of cool 5.10ish multi-pitch routes with a nice mile long hike in.