Desert Fly Information Page for our March 26-28, 2010 trip
http://thelukens.net or the airplanes page or the desert fly page
March 31, 2010
Superstition Mountain Desert Flying – March 26-28, 2010
Everyone,
We had another fabulous time in the desert last weekend. George, Tom, Darren and I arrived early Friday morning and had perfect air all day. We had an unfamiliar truck and trailer head out on the dirt trail towards our camp area that eventually came over when they saw our planes. It was Brian Daley (of San Diego) who builds beautiful planes but only flies in the desert. He accepted our offer for him and his kids and grandkids to join our large group (Sandy and Matt Sanders and Sandy’s wife’s brother’s mother’s uncle’s something or another, Moot and Anne, Eric Sacco, Mike Root, Bob Keigley, and Jason ????). We got our usual military flybys with several F-18s making very low and fast passes and an unusual F-16 flyby as well. As promised, we did some night flying with the aid of flashlights on Friday night. Brian and Jason both had fully tricked out night flyers with led powered glow in the dark wings and fuselages. They were quite visible and required no auxiliary lighting. We finished the evening watching Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and playing Wii bowling and tennis on the big screen until about 1:30 AM.
We were awakened at 5AM by some very gusty wind and had to scramble to secure all of the planes. Luckily we brought gas cars and games because the weather was a bit windy for most of Saturday. The brave ones did a bit of flying during the day but it was a too windy for any precision flying. Darren even treated the crowd to a 3D helicopter routine with 15 mph wind blowing in his face towards the camp – it was as exciting for us as it was for him. The wind finally died down around 5:30 PM and we all got a lot of flying in before dusk. But with the help of a full moon and some bright spot lights we got in another hour or so of night flying, this time even with some unlit planes assisted by a couple of high power spot lights. We fired up the movie theater again and watched Avatar on the king size sheet… I mean screen. We called it an early evening (midnight) and hit the rack hoping for a calm morning.
We were not disappointed Sunday morning. The sky was clear and the winds calm and everyone got in a bunch of flights before we packed up and headed back to San Diego around noon. We even got a flyby from one of Sandy’s friend in his homebuilt bird dog look alike. I’m guessing we had almost 15 people in our core group and Brian’s extended family probably brought the total to 30 people. It was like a small city with lots going on all weekend.
Tom took some great pics (http://picasaweb.google.com/27342tp/DeserFlyMarch2628#) and Jason shot some cool video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqlkhwTCGD8) from his plane. Jason’s video will give you a good feel for just how huge and perfect this flying site is and how many people and vehicles we had there.
We are planning one more desert flying weekend this spring from April 30 – May 2; hopefully before it gets too hot. Mark your calendars now so you can make it out and enjoy at least one day of wide open flying at Superstition Mountain. And get your night flyers ready now so we do formation flying in the dark!
Mark Lukens
http://thelukens.net/airplanes/Desert_Fly.htm
858-945-8525
March 19, 2010
Our next trip to the Superstition Mountains for some wide open desert flying is NEXT WEEKEND!
The weather is currently forecast to be in the mid 80’s during the days with a mild mid 50’s overnight. The winds are again forecast to be in the mid single digits. We have a good size group going again with many of us going out Friday morning again. I will send out a couple of more updates prior to our departure but you can also bookmark my Desert Flying Info page (http://thelukens.net/airplanes/Desert_Fly.htm) so you can get the latest info anytime. Hope you can make it out for a day or two of desert flying and just some plain old fun.
Mark Lukens
858-945-8525
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March 14th, 2010
We are on schedule for our second desert flying weekend on March 26-28; only two short weeks away. We will again have at least two travel trailers there for this trip. Feel free to invite others who might enjoy the weekend flying RC aircraft, racing nitro cars, watching the Blue Angels, playing horseshoes and bocce ball, watching movies on the big screen, roasting marshmallows on the campfire, smoking cigars and sipping scotch, etc. Our last trip was a blast and we’re hoping to have even more people show up for this desert fly. As the weather warms up we can also expect to see the desert in full bloom on this next trip.
It is a short 2:00 to 2:15 minute drive depending on where you depart from and how fast you drive. You can overnight tent camp or stay in your car if you don’t have fancy lodging. There will be access to facilities there for the necessities. Also, you can quite easily make it a worthwhile day trip by packing the night before and heading out early Saturday morning. With daylight savings time in affect and the days getting longer you could easily make it there for breakfast and fly until 7:30 PM.
Let me know if you are interested and I’ll add your name to our weather watch and logistics update list for this weekend. I will be on site Friday morning so feel free to call me with questions.
Information on Superstition Mountain desert flying site: http://thelukens.net/airplanes/Desert_Fly.htm
Mark Lukens
858-945-8525 (m)