I have one, that spanned a whole TWELVE HOURS!!! But, at least it involved a deserted island:
In my younger/crazier days, I was given a book by a friend when that friend found out that I had a pilot's license. The book, "In the Shadow of Eagles", is about Rudy Billberg, a barnstormer-turned Alaskan Bush pilot. After reading the book, I was convinced that I could be a bush pilot too (mind you, without any training...like I said, younger/crazier days). I first sold my experimental Tri-Q2, and then after getting my tailwheel endorsement, bought a 1943 Taylorcraft L2M. I then went out and spent a few months of practice flying from grass strips, and actually got pretty good at take offs and landings using only a few hundred feet of turf.
Problem is, I live(d) in Michigan, where there are not many bush pilot strips or opportunities...so, I decided to "create my own opportunity". I started scouring maps and satellite photos for off-field landing opportunities. I finally found a possible dirt strip: the long sandbar peninsula of the State of Michigan owned High Island:
I decided, one January day, that the long sandbar on the northeast corner of the island (top right in the photo) would be a perfect landing strip. I headed out there almost immediately, and I did all the things that Rudy Billberg wrote about, before I landed. I flew low over the sandbar, looking for large rocks or obstructions. I judged that the distance was long enough. I came down and dragged the sandbar, briefly touching down so my wheels could feel the firmness of the ground (there was no snow that particular winter, but there was cold and ice all around). And finally, I landed, coming to a stop with lots of room to spare. I didn't stay long, but when I left I was excited for summer, because I planned to return and spend a long weekend on the island exploring.
Finally, summer came, and one early June day I headed back to the island. What I didn't realize was that during the winter, the sandbar had frozen solid, but now, it was so soft that I later found out that even walking on the sandbar would be difficult.
This time, I even had my dog with me, seat belted (fortunately) in the back seat...btw, you flew the Taylorcraft solo from the front seat...I also had camping gear, etc. Anyway, this time, I thought I had already done all the "tests" that a bush pilot should do for an off-field landing, so I just set up on the sandbar on a long final, intent to just land. When those wheels touched the sand, I remember a noise that sounded like a bomb went off, and I later estimated that from touchdown to stop was less than ten feet. I was stunned by the abruptness of the "instant stop", but when I gained my senses and looked outside, it seemed very likely to me that I had ripped my landing gear off, because the normal view looking out the window now was about 3 feet "lower". In fact, I even had a hard time opening the door, because the door (which normally was 2 or 3 feet above ground) was now HITTING THE GROUND!
I shut the engine down (the prop WAS still turning),I got out, got my dog out, and just started laughing. I'm not sure why I laughed...maybe because I was alive, or I was screwed, or I don't know. But I just laughed, while my dog ran down the beach chasing seagulls, oblivious to the problem I had just created for the both of us, being on a deserted island at least 6 miles from the next nearest human being, with my expensive airplane seemingly wrecked where it may have to be left behind. As I walked around the plane laughing and looking at my total F up, I realized three things: the landing gear was still there (just hidden/buried in the loose sand), the aluminum prop was still there and actually looked great (it dug a nice hole in the sand), and if I walked and labored through the dry sand over to the wet sand, the consistency of the sand went from a virtual dry quick sand to something close to hard pavement.
I spent the next 10 hours or so making fulcrums from logs on the beach and in the island, digging out and wedged the plane onto logs, moving it inches at a time, until I had finally moved it about 20 feet from the dry sand, over to the wet sand. Only problem was, taking off on the wet sand was going to be like taking off on a curving, banked, sidewalk. The wet area of the sand ran along the beach, curving in and out amongst the small dunes, and was at most eight feet wide. The water dropped off very steeply on the left, the dunes rose very steeply on the right. It took me two attempts to get lifted off, the first time running the plane into the dune which forced me to start over, fulcruming the plane back onto the wet sand. When I finally got the plane lifted off, I literally looked down, and gave the island the finger.
