With you on the autopilot changes, I'm perpetually having trouble with autopilot on anything that wasn't made in the very latest version of X-Plane. (The Lear 25 has an autopilot oscillation in cruise that I just assumed was Austin's fault, not yours. It's mostly just annoying so I've never complained about it.) Sounds like you and I have pretty much settled on the same solutions to flying the ekranoplans, I usually use VVI mode or TERR. ALT mode works as well, as long as real weather is turned off because it crashes whenever the baro pressure changes. Of course in real life these things would have custom-built autopilots using radar (or maybe laser rangefinders) to maintain altitude with a lot more precision than X-Plane can manage.
Love the idea of a "cruise ship" ekranoplan! Might not be too ridiculous in the real world, too; some of the Soviet ones were REALLY big and the Boeing Pelican concept would, if I recall, be the biggest heavier-than-air aircraft ever built.
And just to stay on topic:
Bell 206 at the X-Plane.org Bermuda fly-in last Sunday. (Incidentally, one of your CSL's did get used there, somebody was in a PA-28.)
TH