Tuesday, April 26, 2005

Florida Ridge: Day One

I took my time moving south on Monday. I broke camp at Quest and stopped at Wallaby breakfast on the way south. The sky was crystal blue and nothing was soaring, not even the bugs. Even the smoke stopped climbing above 2000 feet. The field at the Florida Ridge looked good compared to all the damage I saw on the drive there. I am still amazed at how much damage the hurricanes did last year.

I set up my tent and was going to unload my glider when I met Davis. He was very excited about the forecast for Tuesday. Epic. Georgia. New site and maybe state record. Well all that talk sounded good to me so I set up my glider and packed my harness for a quick departure after the pilots meeting this morning. I went to sleep last night dreaming of endless miles of scenery drifting by thousands of feet below me.

Then I woke up. High cumulus clouds were drifting in from the northwest. It looked like the front was already here. Those clouds eventually move away, but as they did the wind picked up. As Greg would say, at least the working cumulus were low, scarce, and weak. The day wasn't cancelled until after noon, but it was obvious much earlier that we would not fly today even though we had a task prepared for Avon Park.

Tomorrow looks wet so it is time to find alternative activities. Mark, Linda, and I went into town for lunch and spent some time looked at aligators in the ditches along the road. I did some mild off-roading and explored some local back roads. I am typing this blog sitting in the open back of my truck in the McDonald's parking lot on their wireless network. At least it is as warm as a summer's evening in New England.

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