Cool Airparks? Airstrips near good boating lakes?

AirBaker

AirBaker

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AirBaker
In an attempt to combine my love of flying with my love of boating, I'm looking to find an airpark type community near a good boating lake. Anyone have any favorite places like this?
 
is this to live or for a getaway or a vacation house?

salt water OK or just fresh water?

any reqs for geographic location?
 
I just read an aritcle on this very topic a month or two ago. I just can't remember where I read it. It might have been pilotgetaways... I just remember a runway surrounded a lake on each side. I'll have to get back to you on that.
 
I've yet to be there yet, but Conchas State Park (E89) looks awesome, so does Navajo Dam (1V0) in New Mexico. I'll be seeing one of the two within the next few weeks.
 
I've flown into Navajo Lake Airport. Nothing there: no fuel, phone, bathroom. Probably a couple miles to walk to the marina. It would be nice if you have someone pick you up there.

Jon
 
4CornerFlyer said:
I've flown into Navajo Lake Airport. Nothing there: no fuel, phone, bathroom. Probably a couple miles to walk to the marina. It would be nice if you have someone pick you up there.

Jon
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Jon is correct. You need to take a moped. Navajo Lake Airport is out in da desert.
 
M94 boating, fishing, golfing and vacation/year round homes
all at the same place
 
Ken Ibold said:
is this to live or for a getaway or a vacation house?

salt water OK or just fresh water?

any reqs for geographic location?
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This would be a vacation home for right now. Eventually a live in home. I'd like to stay ~600 miles from the Bay Area, CA. Hoping for fresher water. :)

Trinity Center looks like the better location all around, but I've yet to venture there.
 
NickDBrennan said:
I've yet to be there yet, but Conchas State Park (E89) looks awesome, so does Navajo Dam (1V0) in New Mexico. I'll be seeing one of the two within the next few weeks.
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You shoudl call the lodge at Conchas State Park before heading out. The water is up about 500% over last year, but still way down. you can also check http://www.emnrd.state.nm.us/nmparks/2003WEEKLY.htm#conchas or see http://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/cgibin/resv-graph.pl?state=NM for more data.

CONCHAS% of Capacity
yellow-bar.gif
41%% of Average
blue-bar.gif
56%% of Last Year
red-bar.gif
591%

Navajo is a great place but the airport is about 2 miles from the Marina. Again, call in advance. They have plenty of water though and the airport is pretty cool.

Good luck.
 
AirBaker said:
In an attempt to combine my love of flying with my love of boating, I'm looking to find an airpark type community near a good boating lake. Anyone have any favorite places like this?
Click to expand...

Lake norman Airpark, NC

http://www.airnav.com/airport/14A

The lake is right beside the runway.


It's turned into a nice live in airpark.
 
This is the one I was thinking of:

Jet sets
If you live the kind of lifestyle where your primary need is easy access from your skier's paradise to a multimillion-dollar business deal in the next state, perhaps Paradise Lakes Estates, near Bakersfield, California, has what you need. There's just one catch: When you hit the ski jump you must observe vertical limits so as not to bump into the airplane of your neighbor.
"We've got 20 homesites, two huge tournament water-ski lakes and a fully FAA-permitted runway right down the middle, so people can taxi to their homes," says Joe Biafora, Paradise Lakes' developer. "Everybody has their own boat, everybody has their own plane, and we have people who commute to and from work by plane."
When the property was nothing more than a hunting club in the 1920s and '30s, it was owned by actors Clark Gable and Andy Devine, who Biafora says "used to just sit up in the shooting tower, drink and blast away." Biafora purchased the duck pond and surrounding land from the Golden State Gun Club and turned it into a site worthy of the water ski Nationals in 1999, 2000 and 2001.
"The best wakes, the best water, the best weather, the best runway," Biafora says.
Home prices: $500K and upward. Dues: $420 a month. Flying up to your own home lake: priceless.

From this link
 
AirBaker said:
In an attempt to combine my love of flying with my love of boating, I'm looking to find an airpark type community near a good boating lake. Anyone have any favorite places like this?
Click to expand...

There are several in the mid-west, Grand Lake of the Cherokees in Oklahoma, Table Rock Lake in Missouri, Lake Of the Ozarks in Missouri. And Minnesota has more than you can count.
 
Don't know where you live but we have ALL that here in Texas at Pecan Plantation. We are on the SE end of Lake Granbury, a 32 mile lake that is friendly to seaplanes. Our fly-in community has about 100 airplanes, a 3600 paved, lighted runway, an EAA chapter and a marina that handles the boat end, though while anyone would want to mess with boats is beyond me (I had the two best days in my life, as the boaters say). We also have two golf courses (for those with lots of extra time), a camp ground and all the Pecans you can eat!
 
Too bad they closed the Colorado strip. Arboles was right next to the campground at the north end.

Eric
 
Dean posted about Grand Lake Regional,
We have a lake house on grand lake and it is a great boating lake, very big! And when you land at the airport they will take you by limo to anywhere on that particular island! You can go straight to rent a boat.
Fun airport to land at to!
 
Iceman said:
This is the one I was thinking of:

Jet sets
If you live the kind of lifestyle where your primary need is easy access from your skier's paradise to a multimillion-dollar business deal in the next state, perhaps Paradise Lakes Estates, near Bakersfield, California, has what you need. There's just one catch: When you hit the ski jump you must observe vertical limits so as not to bump into the airplane of your neighbor.
"We've got 20 homesites, two huge tournament water-ski lakes and a fully FAA-permitted runway right down the middle, so people can taxi to their homes," says Joe Biafora, Paradise Lakes' developer. "Everybody has their own boat, everybody has their own plane, and we have people who commute to and from work by plane."
When the property was nothing more than a hunting club in the 1920s and '30s, it was owned by actors Clark Gable and Andy Devine, who Biafora says "used to just sit up in the shooting tower, drink and blast away." Biafora purchased the duck pond and surrounding land from the Golden State Gun Club and turned it into a site worthy of the water ski Nationals in 1999, 2000 and 2001.
"The best wakes, the best water, the best weather, the best runway," Biafora says.
Home prices: $500K and upward. Dues: $420 a month. Flying up to your own home lake: priceless.

From this link
Click to expand...

I've been there for a couple waterski tournaments, but it comes up short of my idea of paradise. Of course they had the runway closed during the tournament (exhibitor tents in the way) so the aviation part was hardly in evidence (besides very few of the homes actually had aircraft access). The worst part was the dust. This "Paradise" is smack in the middle of a desert, and when the wind blows you can taste the dirt in the air.
 
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