Trip Advice Northern Rockies

I need some advice from my fellow fliers. I'm looking at a trip to Yellowstone the second week of September. Is that too late in the season to venture into West Yellowstone airport? I'm also looking for the best route from Cody to West Yellowstone. It looks like I can follow the river but I worry about winds. I'm only in my -12 so going up and over these big rocks does not look appealing. I'm looking at no more than 11.5K altitude.

Any advice would be welcome.

PS - I've been through Idaho and Wyoming once before but I stayed south of Yellowstone and the really big stuff.

Cody

I have flown to Cody several times starting with a Grumman AA1B, an RV4, and an RV9A. Following the North Fork from Cody west at 11,500 will work if you don't encounter any mountain obscuration. Yellowstone has it's own weather patterns so you need to seek local information. On my last trip heading east, I left Pocatello, Idaho in clear skies and no forecast problems but I could not find a VFR route from Yellowstone Lake to Cody. I detoured north to Livingston, Montana and around the mountains that way.

Be prepared to wait for weather and turn around if necessary.

Randy,

I looked at historical weather from reporting stations along your proposed flight, there are three that I found. Specifically, KCOD, KP60 and KWYS.


Here are the links providing relevant history for the entire month of September 2015 from Weather Underground:

Weather History for (KCOD) Cody, WY - September, 2015:

https://www.wunderground.com/histor...reqdb.zip=82414&reqdb.magic=4&reqdb.wmo=99999

Weather History for (KWYS) West Yellowstone, MT - September, 2015:

https://www.wunderground.com/histor...reqdb.zip=59758&reqdb.magic=4&reqdb.wmo=99999

Weather History for (KP60) Yellowstone National Park, WY- September, 2015:

https://www.wunderground.com/histor...reqdb.zip=82190&reqdb.magic=9&reqdb.wmo=99999

Disclaimer:

I've never flown this route but on the way home from Oshkosh this year we flew from Gillette WY enroute to Wendover NV and made an unscheduled stop in Rock Springs do to a very rough ride caused by turbulence. It gets windy in WY no doubt.

Don't feed the bears....

Randy,
If you get near Caldwell, let me know. I have a hangar at KEUL Caldwell with tools and a car if needed for RV pilots.

rockwoodrv9 said:

Randy,
If you get near Caldwell, let me know. I have a hangar at KEUL Caldwell with tools and a car if needed for RV pilots.

Click to expand...

That is a great post.
It is pilots like you that set the RV community above and apart from other pilot groups. One more reason to join Van's Air Force.