I've flown around a few mountains, some of the tropical kind, and some of the Colorado kind. I think the biggest problem with mountains is that they are high and they are hard.
The height robs power and sticks up into clouds, making cumulous granite clouds the second most dangerous cloud formation (cumulous electric takes my first place).
Mountains are hard, at least as compared to cloudy or dark air, so the helicopter comes to a very rapid stop when flying along and suddenly encountering a mountain-filled cloud.
Mountains are beautiful, with the spectacular ability to cause that gut-wrenching thrill when you fly past a peak and the world falls away at super-sonic speed. When I first soloed, I flew off a cliff face near Breckenridge, Texas at least 30 times just to get that cheap thrill.
Near Leadville Colorado, the peaks are beautiful, and the valleys are filled with yellow-leaved Aspens that look like 10 mile long flower shops. The air is thin, and so is the power margin on most helos, so you rapidly gain respect for airspeed and escape options.
In the Arabian countries, the mountains are red, and the sunsets can bring tears of beauty to your eyes. The valley near the Rum, Jordan's highest mountain, is like Monument Valley in the western flicks, with towering rock pillars jutting 1000 meters above the sandy valley floor where Lawrence lead his troops against the Ottomans. Shut down on the top of the Rum, watch the sun set in measured pace, watch the stars slowly unveil themselves, and you could decide that little else is needed to fill your life, unless you think about battery failure, and how the hell you can get help a mile up a sheer rock-faced cliff.
I think mountains are the place to feel the real thrill of flying. Flatlands are safer, more predictable, and more boring. Gain 1000 feet, and all that flatland stuff looks painted on the canvas. Mountains add punctuation to our flying, I think.
