I looked into helicopter briefly here in NM and was informed that getting a permit to land was difficult and the flight price was too rich for my blood.
Big Fin's Link
A few things to note if you do look into it.
You cannot land on Forest Service lands. You can land on BLM lands, so long as you land on an existing two-track and you have a transporter who is permitted by the BLM to land and transport.
It is far less expensive than most think, if you plan it properly and split the cost among multiple people. Cost is strictly the hourly flight time rate, so plan your shuttle flights accordingly to save airtime and you will save money. It can be done for $800 per guy, if you plan it properly and depending upon how many shuttle trips are needed to haul out any elk that might be taken. Still a chunk of money, but not near the $10K people most often tell me they thought it would cost.
Also understand that if it is a good spot there are probably private aircraft owners who fly in and hunt it. This spot in the video gets plenty of pressure from guys hunting by accessing with private aircraft. If I had a private plane, I would be doing the same thing.
I've investigated many other places where it could be done. It's been three seasons since we last did this. Our main reason for showing it was to give people the incentive to go and enjoy their public lands and not let the hurdles deter them. I think we made that point over the years we did this hunt.
What do you want to hunt? Deer, elk? You better do your homework because for the price you’ll pay you are going to want a really good chance of killing a really big specimen of whatever you hunt. And remember you are in the lower 48 so no matter where you go someone else will be there. Those sections are all hunted by somebody.
Pretty easy.
As grandpa would say, "You get screwed without gettin' kissed."
That landowners isn't going to let me, and probably no other fly-in hunter, on their land to retrieve an elk. So, you have to be very careful in your shots and how you hunt.
Barty1970's Link
And with that, Randy 'Big Fin' Newberg wins the instagoogletweetbooknet for the entire year!!!
Joking apart, I found an interesting piece on the MT FW&P about accessing public which appears to be landlocked by private, through the narrowest slivers of public...which reinforces Randy's excellent advice to use a premium mapping system to identify those hidden access routes
