Mt. Magazine State Park AR & Buffalo Mt. OK

[Dan T]

I'm currently camped at Dardanelle Lake in Russellville Arkansas. Last weekend it hosted an ESPN covered Bassmasters Championship, which while it it's not flying was pretty interesting in it's own right. ESPN put a camera on one of those small quadcopter drones and flew it over the crowd.

Anyway yesterday one of the local pilots shlepped me to Mr. Nebo State Park, Mt. Magazine St. Park, both in Arkansas and then drove 150 miles to Buffalo Mountain in Oklahoma. I had a morning PG flight at Mt. Magazine and an afternoon flight in active air at Buffalo Mountain. My guide flew a topless HG at Buffalo.

The two state parks here in Arkansas are big supporters of the Hang Gliding community. They include us in their 'things to see and do in our park' brochures and encourage highly experienced pilots to fly their sites. Their launch areas are generally roomier than most of ours, their LZs are bigger but somewhat further away with no four-to-one glide bail out options. For that reason most of the flying done here is HG.

Buffalo Mt. near Talihina OK is easily suitable for both wing types and has good XC potential. The local PG/PPG instructor declared his intent to fly from there to the "Sod Farm" near Fort Smith about 60 miles away. They are holding a big PPG fly in there this weekend. I had visions of making the attempt and got high enough to consider it but the sea of trees behind launch dissuaded me.

Dan

[mcelrah]

Thanks for this report. I saw these sites on a HG road trip but we did not fly. Sounds like we need another road trip! - Hugh

[Dan T]

The local biwingal pilot (H4/P2) who showed me around said that to his knowledge I was only the second PG pilot to fly Mt. Magazine. The other pilot is the local instructor. It was a long glide out.

Dan