D

DEWATSON

Well Known Member
My wife and I in our RV8 and a couple with an RV 6A just completed a "round robin" trip to Johnson Creek, Idaho from 49FD in Florida. I wanted to share my statistics to see how we compared to others.

We flew 4,839.9 miles and burned 241.95 gallons of gas. Average fuel price for the trip was $5.66 per gallon. We flew 30.6 hours which yielded 7.9 gallons per hour. Our average speed for the trip including run-ups, taxi and climbs was 158.16 miles per hour. The airplane averaged 20.0036 miles per gallon. It has an Americas Aircraft Engines Titan IO360 engine with a Hartzell constant speed propeller. I was sort of surprised that it did so well. I don't think that we could have driven a full size SUV out there and back that cheaply plus we would not have been able to enjoy America from 9500 feet. It was a very nice trip and Johnson Creek is worth the effort.
 
Very interesting!!

I, and six or seven other RV's are leaving for Johnson Creek this Saturday. We will overnight in Longmont, CO, the first night, and arrive at Johnson Creek on Sunday, June 26th.

Any other details or photos of your trip would be of great interest!!

Thanks,
 
Johnson Creek

The easiest way to land at Johnson Creek is to overfly Yellow Pine and descend into the canyon that leads to runway 17. You can descend slowly around the mountain and slowly turn final for 17. If you land on a left downwind to 17 from the south, it gives you the feeling that you are turning your airplane in a bucket or bathtub. I was quite nervous....this is the way I landed the first time. After another flight, I was fine with both approaches. It just intimidated me at first. I'll also tell you that it gets cold there at night. We got up last Tuesday morning with ice on the airplanes and it was 28 degrees. Take plenty of clothes. The place is absolutely beautiful. Firewood is free for the taking and the caretakers are the best. You can rent the van for $8.00 and drive the 5 miles to Yellow Pine.
 
Thanks for the info...

While this is my first visit there, it is the fifth consecutive year to JC for a couple of the guys I am flying with. They will take good care of us nuggets.

We launch from 7FL4 at 8 am Saturday, can't wait!!
 
Johnson Creek

You will have a blast. Be careful and enjoy yourself. I have about 1000 pictures, but it will take some time to organize and post them. Of course I won't post them all. You'll probably be back before I get them up. You take plenty too. Heck, I'm ready to go back right now!!!!!!
 
ccsmith51 said:
While this is my first visit there, it is the fifth consecutive year to JC for a couple of the guys I am flying with. They will take good care of us nuggets.

We launch from 7FL4 at 8 am Saturday, can't wait!!
Click to expand...

Responses were coming faster than I can type! Great to hear that you will be traveling with some folks that have been there before. Have fun!
 
Hope to make web pages for this trip...

I went to Africa in 2005 and made a web site for the trip: www.africa.cmsdreams.com I hope to do something similar for this trip, with multiple pages of text and pictures of RV's!

We will be camping at JC. We plan on visiting Big Creek, Smiley Creek, West Fork Lodge, maybe camp at one of them. Hopefully the temps will be a bit warmer. How were the winds?

Thanks,
 
Thanks for the suggestion..

One of our team has that book, and we will review it the nights before we make sorties to other strips.

Thanks!!

jetjok said:
If you are going to Johnson Creek, or any of the other great RV accessible runways in Idaho, you should have this book.
It explains the details and idiosyncrasies of of each runway, and also the proper procedures to use for arrival and departure.

http://www.flyidaho.com/catalog/pro..._id=7&osCsid=19c1c28d6872f07b4d0a8bd489d90a22
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Johnson Creek

We were told by the local pilots to do all of our flying prior to 11:00 AM and after about 6 PM. The winds can be nasty between these two times. The local fellows were all flying Super Cubs and Cessna 180s, etc. A couple of them took us up to Mackay Bar for breakfast one morning. What a treat!!!!! The breakfast was great and the flight at 60 MPH was super cool. They flew the entire way down in the canyon over the Salmon River. I worried constantly about being down in the canyon with NOWHERE to land. I guess I'm too used to flying in Florida and south Georgia where there are fields everywhere. Mackay Bar was a back country paradise. The strip was about 1800 feet long and paralelled the river. We never made it to Big Creek or Smiley Creek. There was too much to do at Johnson Creek including making the hike to the bathtub that is so popular. Johnson Creek is absolutley beautiful!!!!! OH, I have already said that. Have fun and get online to check out all of your options. If you wear your RV4 when you fly it, you can certainly fly it into Mackay Bar with no problems. I almost made the trip up river to it, but the weather didn't cooperate and we had to go to McCall for fuel before the weather set in. You can do it if you know your airplane well and I highly recommend visiting there. Like I said, have fun and pay attention and all will go well. I wish I could go with ya'll.
 
Looking forward to the "annual" video

Chris, I hope you have a great trip. Be sure to take lots of photos. I may try to make it to Haller to see you all off at 0800 if I can convince my wife that we can make it to Mayport in time for our young friend's graduation from Sea Camp later that morning. Hopefully the smoke from all of these fires will cooperate and you will have CAVU.
 
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