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There is a grass strip near the Ocean beach to the West of Watsonville CA in central Calif. It is/was owned by a Church school, The Monterrey Academy. Recently the control of the strip (ownership?) has been turned over to a aviation group of people. I have to find out more. Like a club, perhaps.
The strip is on a bluff about 70 feet above the beach. I have wanted to go in there, but have been, let us say a bit concerned about the risk involved.
It is about a 45 minute flight from my home port and when I got there I found that the strip has narrow dirt roads on each side and the farmers had put up plastic greenhouses on both sides of the strip. I swung out over the Ocean and then made a low pass just to give the strip a look. Bit high and fast that time. Second time around all the numbers were right so I put her down.
It was like landing in an alleyway what with the greenhouses on both sides. When I touched down--wow talk about rough. It was patches of grass and soil that seemed to be perfectly spaced to provide the roughest possible surface. Yeeehaa, wild ride. The old Tcraft took it all in stride though, no problem. Adequate surfaced tie down area at the end. No one there but me. This was on a Friday.
I managed to get down to the beach after a pretty good walk to get to the cut with a path down it. Really nice, clean, wide beach. Signs marked it as private ("Go North to public beach"), but the group of students up the beach a ways didn't seem interested in my being there. One couple with kids down the other direction. Huge beach. Nice day with light surf.
Taxi back to end of strip seemed even rougher but takeoff was uneventful. The strip is at an angle to the ocean so you are immediately over the beach and ocean on takeoff.
With my limited experience on that kind of strip it was a risky deal, but in the end it turned out to be worth it.
Darryl
The strip is on a bluff about 70 feet above the beach. I have wanted to go in there, but have been, let us say a bit concerned about the risk involved.
It is about a 45 minute flight from my home port and when I got there I found that the strip has narrow dirt roads on each side and the farmers had put up plastic greenhouses on both sides of the strip. I swung out over the Ocean and then made a low pass just to give the strip a look. Bit high and fast that time. Second time around all the numbers were right so I put her down.
It was like landing in an alleyway what with the greenhouses on both sides. When I touched down--wow talk about rough. It was patches of grass and soil that seemed to be perfectly spaced to provide the roughest possible surface. Yeeehaa, wild ride. The old Tcraft took it all in stride though, no problem. Adequate surfaced tie down area at the end. No one there but me. This was on a Friday.
I managed to get down to the beach after a pretty good walk to get to the cut with a path down it. Really nice, clean, wide beach. Signs marked it as private ("Go North to public beach"), but the group of students up the beach a ways didn't seem interested in my being there. One couple with kids down the other direction. Huge beach. Nice day with light surf.
Taxi back to end of strip seemed even rougher but takeoff was uneventful. The strip is at an angle to the ocean so you are immediately over the beach and ocean on takeoff.
With my limited experience on that kind of strip it was a risky deal, but in the end it turned out to be worth it.
Darryl
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