You can land out there????

Seriously, the Owens Valley is probably some of the most friendly of
the Tiger Country that can be the Great Basin. Most "locals", myself
included, work hard to land on airports,dry lake beds and a very few,
very well documented other sites in order to to mitigate the risks and
have assitance and resources when we hit the ground. There are safe
landing sites every 30-50 miles which works out very well in
"modern" (-20, LS-4, etc) 15m ships. In most stretches, there are
intermediate landing sites which offer a way to land safely, albeit
with increased risks. However, there are some stretches that are
problematic: Cal City - Inyokern, Cinder Cone - Lone Pine, Bishop -
Hawthorne, Mammoth - Bridgeport have all gotten my attention at some
point. All of these have reasonable options; they just require more
pilot awareness and caution.

Retrieves can be long and given the high temperatures and lack of
facilities and services, it is critical that the pilot and crew
vehicles be very well-prepared and well-equipped so you can maintain
your own situation for 24-48 hours which means WATER, WATER, WATER in
the summer. Everything else is secondary. If you land in some
horrendous spot (E side of the Inyo/Whites in Saline or DEATH
Valleys), 5 gallons for the pilot may barely be adequate for a poorly
planned and executed situation. Cell phone service in the Owens
Valley proper is generally good.

Come on out and (safely) enjoy our spectacular playground!