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Show " ' -; . ... i 1 ' . T'J - . : - .-. ...... ', ,., -.. . .; ' - - . -, - - .- ." " " '. ' '. , - - : ' r-t'-V -..- -C"-" - -t.' : v--.". 1. : , " 3 f--''t-. . : . . . ... . - . v,.- - I - -v. y:r r-" 4 .v: v - ?vt-- - - . i. i I . v from an airplane can you get this view of Wash-n,,;r:ja Wash-n,,;r:ja Aich in Canyonlands National Park. The iir Trip Over Canyonia nds Park Brings Wque New Impression of Area Scenery By Fran Barnes iTeryose has heard of ifiirjs from a bird's e Tiiw. but the fact is. s: is the only way there : ses much of the wild :-;iacds country of !.cis:era Utah. This :ii5 50 vast, broken and dess. that only birds a good look at most :: birds and airplane :;;:rers. that is. A:i only certain air-;:;s. air-;:;s. even then. The bi? jpzercial airliners fly Jt iiiga and fast to per-t per-t rlixirg anthing but ! i;'or features of this i::::e rook maze. J There are several ad-1 ad-1 -rrous pilots, however. 1 '' specialize in flying I -"'s:s low enough, and I ':'-7 enough, over the cacrons, arches and -z' fantastic features abound in Southeas-" Southeas-" Utah, that, all these : te seen to perfection. . Not Bush Pilots .isrs-here else, you call these pilots -A" pibts," but the -7 terrain of south-:--n Utah has so little that perhaps (i pilots" would - be a ; appropriate term for ' unique fellows. Piloting four to eight passenger light planes over, ov-er, around and through the stone wilderness of the canyonlands takes special spec-ial skills. The deep gorges and looming plateaus of reflective rock make for rough air and unpredictable unpredict-able air currents. Canyon-lands Canyon-lands scenic pilots try to avoid this problem by planning most of their tours in the morning, when the air is calmest, but must always be on the alert for tricky air. And it takes skill and firm control to guide a plane down the twisting depths of a deep river canyon, with solid rock walls zooming past at 150 miles an hour! Breathtaking- Views For the plane's passengers, passen-gers, air touring is an absolutely ab-solutely breathtaking way of viewing the veritable fantasyland of nature's sculptures that make up the canyonlands. Vast chasms, Indian ruins, towering tow-ering pinnacles, upthrust mesas, soaring stone arches ar-ches and bridges, wild river gorges, serpentine rivers ri-vers like the Colorado, Green, San Juan and Es-calante, Es-calante, and the unbeliev- human figure in this spectacular arch is hundreds of feet tall. ,. able blue of Lake Powell, are all spread out below, like a mind-boggling relief re-lief reap. Nothing can match viewing view-ing Utah's canyon country coun-try by air. On foot or by vehicle, you get a worm's eye view. Everything is above you, unless you are brave enough to stand at the very edge of a sheer cliff or canyon rim, and even then your view is limited. From boats you get an even lower and more limited viewpoint, that of a fish. But from the air you see everything from the viewpoint of a wild, free, bird. You can sail high above, looking majestically majestical-ly down on a thousand square miles of beauty, or drop to mid-level beside a line cf red cliffs hundreds hund-reds of feet high, and get the feeling of being surrounded sur-rounded by ancient rock. Or, if you spot something you want to see closer an arch, a float trip going through Cataract Canyon, an untouched Indian ruin, a skier on Lake Powell you can drop still lower and circle, like a soaring bird around the object of your interest. Air Tours Offer Several good air tour guides offer regular services ser-vices from various places in southeastern Utah. All have had years of experience experi-ence at flying the canyonlands. can-yonlands. All are highly safety conscious, and very knowledgeable about the country they fly. Most of them offer free brochures that list their various flight routes and what can be seen on these. There's a scenic flight to fit every purse, with prices ranging from $4.95 for a 15-minute "quickie" over the Needles section of Canyonlands National Park, to flights of a half-day half-day or mora for upwards of" $100. Flight Services Page Aviation operates out of Page, Arizona, near Glen Canyon Dam, and offers of-fers a wide variety of flights over Lake Powell and adjacent country. Hub-Air. operating out of the Moab Airport, has a variety of air tours over Canvonlands N a t i o n al Park, Lake Powell and other equally magnificent areas. Carbon - Emery Flying Service flies from the Price airport and is within with-in easy range of loads of outstanding scenery, including in-cluding the fantastic San Rafael Reef. Lloyd Roper's Scenic Aviation operates out of Blanding, and is close to such novel features as Natural Na-tural Bridges National Monument and the many Indian ruins on the slopes of and in the canyons below, be-low, the Abajo Mountains. Dick Smith's Canyonlands Canyon-lands Aviation operates from an airstrip at the Canyonlands Resort,- near the entrance to the Needles Need-les section of Canyonlands National Park. Dick specializes sp-ecializes in shorter flights into Canyonlands National Nation-al Park, but also provides longer tours over other scenic southeastern Utah areas. Some of these air tour operators also offer combination com-bination air-land, or air-water-land tours, so if you have the time and inclination, in-clination, you can explore a favorite piece of scenery scen-ery from all viewpoints. Of course, only days and weeks spent savoring the infinite details of canyonlands country can bring you a full appreciation apprecia-tion of its indescribable beauty. But if you want a preliminary pre-liminary "wide screen" look at some of this country coun-try before starting to explore ex-plore it more thoroughly, try a flight over canyonlands canyon-lands country with one of the pilots who specialize in air tours. There's nothing no-thing else on this planet that can compare with the scenic grandeur you will see. |