We've been flying more than writing this month - the way things should be? In August we did the second safari of the summer - a week long meander through flying sites in Lakeview and the California/Nevada border. Before we hit the Owens Valley, the weather fairy sent us home with stable, stable, terribly stable skies. I was hoping not to be the scribe for Safari II of 2011, so I left a blank draft, for yes, you, papirtiger :-o)
Cookie girl style, I've been learning more valuable lessons this summer. How to deal with turbulence and how to pull off of launch and still have a good day. Couple of good stalls while falling out of thermals made me rethink my flying style and what's next - but that's not what this post is about. I had the opportunity to do the photo shoot of a life time this weekend. So spread the word, hang gliding is one of the most beautiful things you can do.
I flew an incredibly sinky sledder at Slide on Saturday, hitting 900 ft down for a minute and then 800 down for another minute. Stomach in a crunch, I was happy to land, after another LZ thermal tease. LZ thermals are becoming my specialty. Other pilots had better fates, with two or so getting above 10000'. Sunday we woke up, paid Slide launch a visit, but did not pay Slide visit a launch, and made a slow decision to drive down to Sweetwater for hopes of late afternoon flying. Those hopes paid off.
By the time I climbed out of launch, without too much effort, [see pic], two pilots had left on XC, two were soaring launch and the peak down south, and the rest of the crew was lined up to go.
After about 20 minutes of ridge soaring, and a few rough patches, I chose to go thermal closer to the LZ. I recorded clayble's landing from the air, lined up my approach right next to him, then broke down quickly (thanks for helping Karen!) and went to chase, along with Karen, the XC crew. They made it to two different sides of Topaz lake, which took us awhile to figure out. Handheld radios do not work well inside cars. Errrggghm.
The night brought some hot tubbing, and whisky which resulted in me walking in thermal-like patterns on the ground.
Forward to Monday, I chose not to fly, but do driving duty. Given a somewhat promising and scary sky, I chose to drive, but instead mostly fulfilled camera-duty. Launch was soarable, but due to prevailing wind from the west, or south-west, without much thermal activity - so all pilots congregated on the launch ridge, high and low, low and high, standing between me and some drop dead gorgeous sierras and clouds. So there you have it.
