so i finally did the trip ive been planning for like 2 years, drove out to arizona, had my mini 3 pro packed and ready. did all my research ahead of time or so i thought. turns out basically the entire south rim is national park land and you absolutely cannot fly there without a special permit that takes months to get and is almost never approved for recreational use. i knew national parks had restrictions but i guess i assumed there were spots just outside the boundary where you could get a decent shot. nope. rangers were everywhere and i saw someone else get their drone confiscated near the visitor center which was not a fun thing to witness.

ended up driving about 40 minutes to some BLM land east of the park and honestly got some decent footage from there but it wasnt quite the angle i wanted. just wish there was a better consolidated resource for this stuff because the NPS website is not exactly user friendly when youre trying to figure out airspace vs land jurisdiction questions

yeah the national park thing catches so many people off guard. i made the same mistake at zion two years ago, didnt even take it out of the bag once i realized. the BLM land workaround is genuinely the move though, did the same thing near bryce canyon. takes more planning but you get less crowded shots anyway so its kind of a win

UAV Forecast and Aloft are decent for airspace but youre right they dont tell you anything about land use rules which is a totally separate thing from airspace authorization. a lot of people dont realize you can have a LAANC clearance and still be completely illegal on the ground if its restricted land. its kind of a two layer problem and nobody explains it well