CSP Float Fly

by Bob Olson
In recent years, we’ve taken our act to Stockade Lake as a float fly and we did just that on Saturday and Sunday, May 22nd and 23rd.

Our Saturday arrival was greeted by members, Tom Pekarna and Jim Grimes, who trailered their boat out from Custer to serve as plane retrievers. Tom also brought along a couple of steamboats to ply the ‘whitecaps’ on Stockade Lake. ‘White caps’ may be a little bit of an exaggeration, but not much. It was pretty breezy.

Not to be deterred we put planes in the water and quite soon a crown of visitors was looking over our shoulders. Another out of town arrival was Don Thorson of Newcastle. He brought his big Mariner along and flew that. He also had another Quadra powered float plane with him, but the high altitude kept it in the taxi mode instead of in the air.

Ken Corrin his a new OS .45 in his Mariner and that certainly improved the reliability and performance of that float plane. Ken made quite a few flights both Saturday and Sunday.

Darrell Cassidy had his Sea Master along and put on quite a show for the assembled crowd.

Denny Bernal has four float planes with him and he put several flights on all of them. He had his tried and true Piper Cub, and the little yellow .25 size trainer. The OS .32 in that plane pulled it right out of the water with no problems. He also flew his tuned pipe hot rod. But probably the crowd favorite was his big Beaver. He had that in the air quite a bit over the two days. That plane just looks good and flies good.

I put in several flights with my two Eagles. Old Lake Wobegon has been around the lake quite a bit, but it still flies well and I enjoy it. My new Eagle is a great plane and is turning into one of my favorites. Easy to see in the air as well.

Doc McGuigan had his Canadair along but on its one and only Saturday flight, it had a hard landing that separated the wing from the fuselage. Thanks to a bottle of epoxy from Ken Corrin, he had it in the air again on Sunday. The sound of those twin engines was a crowd pleaser too.
On Sunday were we increased in numbers by the presence of John Pondish. He and Doc tried and tried to get his new Seawind off the lake but the altitude was just too much for it.

Tom Pekarna had his two steamboats out several times and Don Thorson had a speedboat with and electric outboard that really moved.

Also giving a helping hand to the floaters were John Kellogg and Gene Kelley.

A special thanks goes to Tom and Jim and their stalwart (and frequent) work as the retrieval crew. We couldn’t have done it without them.

My apologies if I left anyone out.

(Editor’s note: Many thanks to Bob Olson for providing the notes and Ken Corrin and his son for all the great pictures)