Glenns Ferry Airport (U89)

From Mountain Home we followed the train tracks to the river and landed just after the badest 182 I’ve ever seen. On short final I saw we were a bit low and the barbwire fence which is just before the runway surprised me and our landing was a bit uglier than I like (I’m a perfectionist).

Taxing over the the 182 we were following in the pattern we met quite possibly the coolest 79 year old pilot cruising the skies over idaho, Jack G. What this guy did to his 182 was awesome, you had to see it for yourself because I simply don’t know the names of all the modifications. Adding the fact that he is 79 years old and doesn’t appear to be a year over 60 even made him that much more interesting!!

From Glenns Ferry we followed the river at about 500 feet over to bruno sand dunes where we had to cut across the hills to avoid controlled airspace. From the valley south of bruno we resumed our river navigation tour. I could write a book about the snake river, it is simply amazing from the air. The whole flight we were talking about the fact that if you look south from I-84 you see nothing but desert, never in your wildest dreams would you think there would be such pretty farm filled valleys with a river of equal beauty to that of the Colorado here in southern Idaho.

Question: I tried repeatedly to contact Mountain Home AFB tower for permission to fly thought their airspace, no response. I decided to avoid it, but what would you have done? Is it controlled airspace when the tower is not occupied? Getting shot down by a F-15 seemed like a bad idea at the time 🙂