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Road Trip 10/5-10

From: K Dumain
Activity_Date: Oct 5-10
Remote Name: 172.143.19.66

Comments

Hit the road last Friday to take some time off and do some flying.

Friday: Tehachapi, met up with Doug, one of the locals. He gave me the brief. Its bumpy but never had anything worse than a 30%. 30 seconds into my flight, the left side completely collapsed as I made my first turn to the right. Only got to 55 before the winds became a problem. Spent a long time just trying to reach the ground. Doug almost couldn't. Could have relaunched from the parking lot.

Saturday: Owens, hooked up with Chad and crew, then Kari Castle and pilots from the Bay Area. We all went to Piute. light south at LZ, NW drift at launch. Kari put on some nice light scratching for about half and hour. Then Christina from up north hooked the first good thermal which drifted her up and to the SE. The rest of us quickly jumped into our wings and launched. I found a new lift source over the cliffs to the left and was soon surrounded by a gaggle of pilots in the trashy air. Christina's lift gave away and I spotted her on glide down low along the shady side of the canyon. Gotta take the lift towards the sunny bumps I figured. Flew for an hour then had a bumpy wiggly wing ride most of the way to the LZ. After an hour of good soaring, the conditions got fatter and people started flying South. Eric made it to Flynn's. Eric Reed??? from the US team made to Black Mountain then back to the airport. Parajames boated around for close to 4 hours trying to achieve a drive to fly ratio of 1.0. He claims to have reached 14,000 after we left him to go on chase.

Sunday: Piute again, less wind, rougher up high, smoother down low. Pronounced inversions over the valley. Chad and Jim got things rolling a bit earlier. The thermal over the cliffs was a real thumper down low. After one low pass I decided to scratch a bit harder then connect with that lift a bit higher. Less wind, with just a bit of drift from the WSW. OTB up high. Eventually got to 95. Chad and Jim peaked a bit over 10. Leanne was persistent. Early tendency was to climb your way out the back of the air columns. Left at 95 but sank all the way down the next sunny ridge to the north. Once again after I landed it got fatter. Chad and Leanne headed south. Eric lead the way north. At Gunther's Chad hit the south wind and turned back. Meanwhile Kate and Nancy were working north on a high line. Longest flight went to Nancy.

Monday: Torrey Pines evening flights. First time for me to fly there. Straight in and overcast. Cold and damp. Flew about 2 hours. Past the golf courses to the north and past the mansions to the south. The flag showing light rotor down by Scripps was a trip.

Tuesday: Mexico, got to La Salinas late. Couldn't get my truck up the road or my sister up the trail. It looked good though.

Wednesday: OTB at Horse, the start of this offshore cycle that might squelch the weekend. Blossom was light and NW, but the inversion was really crisp just above launch. Definitely want to fly Blosom on a good day, and soar El Cap. Figured Torrey would be more fun. It was, strong and NW. Definitely more erratic than the Cox. Ripples of rotor will sneak up on you.

Thursday: picked up my boat and returned home, should be nice on Lake Cachuma this weekend.

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