10-03 Gone Flyin'

CURTIS AND "FOUR PAPA SIERRA" Here's where this little adventure got its start-- at the Casparis Airport in Alpine, Texas, one of my favorite haunts. The pilot, Curtis, and and the Volunteer Pilot's Assistant, Howard, had stopped in to refuel N104PS, known in radio lingo as "Four Papa Sierra" (the last three digits of its N-number), and I just happened along shortly afterward. I got to chatting him up and the next thing I knew, I was invited along for a flight the next day -- if the park was going to need him to fly a patrol sweep, that is. Turned out it did, and we were set.

"FOUR PAPA SIERRA" AT HOME And here we are, me and my co-passenger, Natasha (well, that's her, anyway; I'm behind the camera), at Four Papa Sierra's hangar at Harte Ranch. Lots of room at this place!

HANGAR VIEW Here's a shot from the inside, showing the awesome view. Not too shabby.

ALL PREPPED AND READY TO FLY The preflight doings are done and 4PS is taking in a little sun while the last-minute things are taken care of, such as the shutting of the hangar door, which is happening at the moment.

ADIOS, PEPE A shot of Pepe's rear end as we get ready to roll out. We'll be back in 1.84 hours, amigo.

CURTIS AND HOWARD A shot looking forward into the cockpit area. Unfortunately, I could either get the view out the window or a shot of the pilot and co-pilot. I chose the latter.

NATASHA A grab shot of Natasha just for grins. We all wore these headsets so we could communicate over the engine noise.

. . . AND ME! Of course, I wasn't going to let such an opportunity go by without catching myself in the act.

AND WE'RE OFF! A shot of the scenery off to the northwest as we climb out of Harte Ranch. That's Santiago Peak (elev. 6,524') looming off in the distance all by itself. Even though it looks like a volcano, it's not. It is volcanic in nature, though.

BIRD'S EYE VIEW This is one of the things I love most about flying -- getting to see mundane objects from above, such as this dilapidated house. Looks like all it needs is a new roof, but looks can be deceiving up here.

STRAIGHT LINES I finally found out what these lines are. According to our park geologist, Don Corrick: "The straight lines are the park's attempts to revegetate the bare, eroded soil. We put down grass seed, cover it with excelsior mats, then cover that with brush. The brush has an important job -- to shade the soil so that the seeds and seedlings don't fry in the heat. The reveg lines are laid out along contour lines to intercept slope-wash runoff." Mystery solved. Thanks, Don!

ROSILLOS MOUNTAINS FOOTHILLS Of all the mountains in the park, the Rosillos are probably my favorite for their sheer beauty, and because they formed my front door panorama when I lived at Persimmon Gap. Their foothills hold a subtle beauty of their own.

3-D TOPO MAP I was particularly struck by the foothills' resemblance to a topographic map, showing different lines at different elevations. From above and to the side, they look like a topo map in relief.

ROSILLOS CLOSEUP One of the fun things about this flight will be lack of altitude deviation for the most part. If a mountain comes up, we just fly around it instead of over it. Sometimes, as in the case of Mule Ears later, we'll merely fly between mountains. That's my way of flying!

UNDULATING SCENERY It's amazing how much some of the scenery around here looks like a storm-tossed ocean when viewed from above. I'm not sure, but I believe that's one of our backcountry roads, possibly leading out to the Paint Gap 4 campsite.

SCULPTED LANDFORM I was struck by the variety of colors and texture in that little hill out there in the distance. I wish we could've gone over for a closer look.

LAND OF TURMOIL Wow, would you look at all the action going on down there! This stuff is truly amazing. Notice the "fin" (the dark raised diagonal line) heading our way. That's a volcanic intrusion that filled a long crack in the earth. You see a lot of those around here, as this place was quite active eons ago.

FIN OF FIRE That's what the interpretive exhibit on the Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive calls these types of formations (although the formation is more commonly called a "dike"). I guess Fin Of Fire is a fairly good definition, though, as that's exactly how it was formed. Pretty cool, huh?

BOWL OF COLOR Just look at the beautiful colors in this eroded bowl. There are no colors added in, folks; that stuff's really there.

ERODED MEANDER It's funny how this meander in the streambed caused the side of the hill to crumble away, exposing the layers underneath. Again, note the variation in color.

MOUNTAIN AHEAD At first I thought this might be Cerro Castellan, but it isn't. It's Bee Mountain.

MULE EARS ON THE HORIZON Well, they don't look much like mule ears from this perspective, but that's what this dual-spire rock formation is called.

WE HAVE MULE EARS That didn't quite come out right, did it? Anyway, here we are a little closer to the Mule Ears pinnacles. It's not looking much like mule ears anymore.

MULE EARS FROM BEHIND And here we see Mule Ears from a perspective not often seen. Even from the other side, they don't really look like mule ears to me; more like Batman's hood. Batman wasn't even around when this formation was named, though, so we're sticking with Mule Ears. Right now we're flying between Trap Mountain (where Mule Ears is) and Goat Mountain on the other side of us.

UPLIFT Here we see the effects of brutal geological forces that caused a portion of the earth to crack and lift up, taking who knows how many years.

FISHEYE EFFECT No, I don't have a fisheye lens for my little camera (wish I did!), it's just a peculiar arrangement of vegetation. That's the Rio Grande River along the very top of the frame. We're now at the southern edge of the park and headed toward Santa Elena Canyon.

CASTOLON FROM THE BACKSIDE This is the Castolon historic district. That long low building is an old Army barracks that was built but never used. When the Army pulled out, the La Harmonia Store moved in from its former residence on the Rio Grande River floodplain. There will be a better view of this later.

SANTA ELENA CANYON If it weren't for that wing strut, this would be a great shot looking into Santa Elena Canyon. I still like it, though. Man, the river is really low right now, as I've never seen it that narrow right here. The look of it has really changed since the 2008 flood.

SANTA ELENA CANYON - AGAIN Not too bad a shot, I guess, but I liked the view in the other one better.

CERRO CASTELLAN IN THE DISTANCE That dark, pointy mountain in the near distance is Cerro Castellan. I think the mountain I mistook for it earlier (to its left) was Bee Mountain.

WELCOME TO MEXICO And now we're on the Mexican side of the river, in suspicious territory (drug activity).

MORE STRAIGHT LINES This may very well be Mexico's attempt at revegetation that we saw in picture 11. It looks like runoff broke through in several places. Nature finds a way.

LANDSCAPE FROM ANOTHER PLANET I kept thinking this was an optical illusion, and that the gullies were sunk in the ground, but they're not -- they're actually set above the plain. Very odd, indeed.

CASTOLON REVISITED And here we are sidling by Castolon again, this time from the "front" side of it. Again you can see the long building (Enlisted Quarters) that houses the store and Visitor Center. The building at the bottom of the hill is the Alvino House. Up above it and looking as if it's about to slide down the hill is the Garlick house. To its right is the Magdelena House. Of the two buildings on the edge, the one on the right was the Officers' Quarters and the one on the right was the NCO Quarters. Right behind the store was the recreation hall, and the building way out back was the granary and tool shed. The small building to the right of the store and VC was the latrine and is still in use as such, although much renovated.

SANTA ELENA, CHIHUAHUA, MEXICO This is the little town of Santa Elena, across the river in Mexico, for which the canyon was named. I've also seen it spelled Santa Helena.

CHISOS MOUNTAINS I couldn't resist taking a shot of the Chisos Mountains off in the distance. If you'll notice, Curtis flies with a small amount of flaps extended. This puts the airplane in a slightly nose-down attitude to make it easier to see ahead. Pretty smart!

VARIFORM HILLS This sort of reminds me of an anticline, but I'm not sure that's what this is. I dubbed it "variform" since that seems to suit its appearance. Crazy scenery, whatever the case.

HOODOO CASTLE Oh, here we go. Now, that's a hoodoo, folks! And, if you look just below the left-hand side of it, you'll see what appears to be a house there on the side of the hill. I'll have to look at the full-sized file to pull it in better, but that really looks like one to me. What a hell of a place to put a house -- right in the middle of a runoff. Huh. I'll have to ask the park archaeologist about that.

BANTA'S SHUT-IN (SORT OF) I'd always heard of Banta's Shut-in, but had never seen it before. I asked where it was, but Curtis told me we'd just passed it, so I took a quick shot back at it. I guess this is it.

PITCOCK ROSILLOS RANCH We're now flying past the Pitcock Rosillos Ranch, an inholding here in the park. I'd asked if these long, straight patterns were former airfields, but Curtis said they weren't, that they were actually old crop fields. You could certainly use them for airstrips.

ON APPROACH TO HARTE RANCH Well, it had to happen sooner or later. Here we are on approach to Harte Ranch after a throroughly enjoyable 1.84 hours of flying. Thank you, Curtis!!! Landings here at the ranch are tricky, due to the runway pointing downhill, so you take off downhill and land uphill, flaring out just over the threshold and then giving it power, flying the plane all the way to the ground. He did an excellent job of landing, I have to say. It didn't bounce once.

REFUELING FOUR PAPA SIERRA This is Howard refueling the plane, which took around 30 gallons. Uh-oh! I just noticed a safety hazard -- the ladder's support arm isn't down and locked. I didn't even see it then.

BACK IN THE HANGAR And here's where it'll stay until next fall when either Curtis returns from Alaska or a new park pilot comes on duty. As there will be prescribed burns in the park to monitor this summer, though, we may have to come up with another pilot to fly it, maybe on a detail. Okay, that's it for now. I hope you enjoyed the show!