Moving to Cooperstown?

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Steve Johnson

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Dec 8, 2022, 6:34:58 PM12/8/22
to Upstate NY Free Flyers
Hi all,

I'm potentially moving to near Cooperstown for work.  I've flown HG for about 12 years but also picked up PG in the last 1.5 years.  Most of my flying has been towing in the Midwest.  However, I've travelled to fly several sites in the mountain west, west coast and a few times in Europe. 

I've never flown out east. How is the flying in the northeast?  I currently get about ~50-70 hours a year flying 2-3 good weekends a month.  Does the weather allow y'all to fly at least a few weekends each month throughout the year?  If I'm based near Cooperstown, how much driving will I be doing to keep in the air?

Thanks!

David Koehn

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Dec 8, 2022, 9:24:36 PM12/8/22
to Upstate NY Free Flyers, Steve Johnson
Wow! Another local pilot. That would be great!

I'm in Oneonta (25 minutes south of Cooperstown).  Mt. Utsayantha (in Stamford, NY) is where I mainly fly. It's about 40 minutes from Oneonta and 50 from Cooperstown. It has 3 different launch directions(NE, WNW, SSW). The latter two can be quite unforgiving of any launching issues.  Fortunately, Susquehanna Flight Park is just outside of Cooperstown and you can do lots of foot-launch practice there. Plus it can be soarable there too on a good day.

The biggest problem around here is the good day.  If you have a highly flexible schedule you can get a reasonable amount of flying in, especially if you are willing to drive to some of the other sites that are a little easier (Harris Hill - 2.5 hrs, Ellenville, 2.5 hrs, West Rutland - 3.0 hrs).  If you are stuck with just the weekends, it can be tough if the weather doesn't cooperate.  Without any tow options around here, all the of sites can be very wind speed-and-direction-dependent.

I have a lot of flexibility in July and August, but am generally limited to weekends and evenings in the spring.  I've mostly stopped flying in the fall and winter as I'm too busy to burn the time on a short flying window.  Utsayantha and the Flight Park will usually be snowed in until sometime in April, but with the PG you could hike in if you really wanted to. PG is on hold for me until I can hopefully retire in a few years and commit the time it takes to staying properly current and capable of dealing with all the s*** that can go wrong on one.

Again, if you do move to Cooperstown, that would be great to have another local pilot!

Dave K.


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