Matt,

Your right, it is a trade off, good luck with whatever you choose.

Just one word of warning, whilst the Phoenix sim is very accurate for helis I dont think it is as accurate for flying planes. Not sure why but I thinkmainly because unless you have set the conditions in the sim to have some breeze (you have to go out of your way to do this) the default is not a breath of air while your flying and this is not real world and gives you an inflated view of your flying abilities.

I can fly the beejeeses out of a Mustang on Phoenix, but I would quickly crash and burn in real life (I've got a 1.2 metre wingspan Mustang that fairly zooms through the rir and haven't been brave enough to fly it yet because I know what will happen in the ball park that I normally fly - there's just not enough room, I'd need something the size of a couple of major league ball parks.

I'd go with the mini supercub then, although the Champ is a whole lot easier to fly, and you could fly it in the park you decribed (cause you couldn't hurt someone with it if you tried) it does get blown about by a slight breeze, which makes it a challenge (but fun) to control.