Cloud Explosion

Like yesterday, I was the first to launch. Unlike yesterday, I had the text-book perfect tow. I followed Carlos through the buttery smooth air until we center-punched a smooth 700 fpm up. Carlos waved, I pinned off, waved back, and started circling. I took that sweet smelling orange blossom express to cloud base. I was dancing around the cloud's edge before the next glider was even rolling across the field. That's the way it should always be!

I surfed the side of the cloud while the rest of the XC gang climbed out. Mick called a task to the Citrus Tower in Claremont, Quest, and back to the ranch. Mike and I left together as the sky exploded with clouds. The lift was strong with clouds forming below us, around us, and beside us. I flew to the 192 - 27 intersection before I saw any blue or made any turns. Mike and I raced north, him on the west side of 27 and me on the east side. I had a slight lead until there was a "weak spot" in the line of clouds on the east side. I crossed over 27 to the west side as Mike flew in over me. Mike kept pushing on while I slowed down before heading over the town of Claremont under the now seriously overdeveloped sky. Mike found a good climb near the tower that I was more than happy to slip into.

The area between the tower and Quest was stable looking with high blow-off from the earlier cloud explosion. I took a deep breath and jumped in. I arrived at the other side low, too low to even reach Quest. Luckily I found some bubbles that first got me high enough to sneak into Quest and then finally high enough to consider shopping for something better. Jason joined my climb, then Mike, and then several rigid wings.

Mike and I climbed to base and headed back. We fanned out looking for lift under the decaying sky. It was way too smooth and every cloud we investigated was silent. We were getting low and had maybe one more chance to find the elevator. Mike faded left and I went south towards some sunlit fields. I flew through some chop but no lift. We were now too far apart to rejoin. Mike eventually landed at the state park and I circled in broken lift over those fields for a long time. Slowly it turned into a real climb of 100 fpm and finally 200 fpm. Some time later Dave flew in overhead.

Dave was still much higher when we left, but a least I had enough altitude to search for something. We had a gentle glide under an old cloud line but I needed another climb soon. I spotted a 1500 foot high dust devil coming from a construction site near the 27 - 474 intersection and prompted headed for a spanking. Before I could get my punishment Dave called me back to a 600 fpm climb that I couldn't find. Dave headed home while I took a few more minutes to find the climb further upwind.

Once back to base, I had an easy glide in; in fact too easy. I was climbing at 500 fpm while on final glide; so much for blazing in at tree-top height. I gave up, slowed down, and watched Dave land and Kerry pull someone up. I unzipped my harness, spread my legs to create my custom drogue chute, draped my hands over the base bar in the smooth air, and waited for gravity to do its job. A few minutes later I looked down and saw Kerry just a few yards directly below me. Dang, I wish I had the camera ready. He waved up and I waved back with both hands. Too cool.

A short time after I landed Mick arrived after clawing his way out of a hole just north of the ranch. Way to go Mick!

I was in the air 3 hours and flew a 51 mile triangle with 6 climbs. This might be my last flight here before heading south to the Florida Ridge for the nationals.

Where's the Off Switch

After the long flight to Georgia yesterday, I just wanted to fly for a couple hours and then chill with the pilots arriving for the upcoming meets. Brian, Dave, Steve, Jim, and Al are here.

I was the first to launch again and Carlos and I slammed into something wicked at the south end of the field around 700 feet. Carlos fell off to the left and I shot up to the right. I tried to correct but knew how this storied would end. I released, did a quick search, and started climbing over the trees drifting north. Once above 1200 feet I relaxed and started watching the action on the launch line below. Kerry and Mike started the takeoff roll but the tug stalled after Mike was in the air. Mike tried again only to break a weak link coming out of the cart. Mick and Mike eventually started a slow climbing. I wanted to keep the flight short so I decided to head out by myself towards Quest.

I was traveling up Route 27 having a good time not paying enough attention to the conditions. Before long I was low and looking for an LZ south of 474. I boxed a sunny field and found a broken climb that took forever to mature.

Meanwhile Mike flew overhead heading to Quest. Once back up I had an easy glide into Quest and climbed with Jason before heading south along Route 33. Once again I was uncomfortably low looking for a lift north of the glider port under wispy excuses for clouds. Mike found a strong climb west of the glider port but he was beyond my reach. I pressed on and found a strong smooth climb to the southwest of the glider port and then had an easy glide back to the ranch.

However, as I approached the ranch the lift gradually increased to 800 fpm over the field. The windsocks were dancing around so I decided to park in a climb and take some pictures of Steve and Captain Mick at cloud base. Once done with the photo shoot I was ready to land; remember I only wanted a short flight. I glided to the southwest, got low, and headed back. Once again I encountered strong lift over the field. Dang. I looked for sink but couldn't find any. I gave up, relaxed in a climb, and checked out the scenery. I did some speed runs and came back low. Yep, still lifting off. I began to worry that a sea-breeze front was moving through but there weren't any signs of that happening. I got on the radio and asked for the guys on the ground to find the "lift" switch and turn it off. I finally got so tired I just blasted in not caring which way the wind was blowing. I had a good landing in variable winds and was dragging tired butt around for the rest of the evening.

I was in the air 4 hours 45 minutes and covered a 53 mile triangle.

Georgia

I was up early tossing things into the truck so I could meet Paul and Lauren at Quest Air. The tugs at Wallaby were "parked" at 1500 feet, so the forecast for strong wind in the morning was right on. Once at Quest I exchanged telephone numbers with Dave who offered to drive before asking where we were going. You should have seen his face when we said "Georgia"!

We were worried when the winds were still shaking the trees at 10:30. It was obvious we wouldn't be starting early so flying a recording-breaking flight unlikely. I saw some lulls in the wind about the time the pilots sitting under the shade tree starting wondering if the day was a total loss. I didn't want to be a part of that "scene" so I just started getting ready to fly. By noon there were nice launch cycles and I pushed out right behind Davis.

Bo towed me dropped me in a weak climb upwind, but it was bittersweet since Davis was beaming to the north up over Groveland. No worries, I was climbing and the rest of the gang were just getting ready to launch. I drifted north searching for any climb while Paul got dropped in a strong climb to the west. I thought I might land north of town but found a broken climb that got me high enough so I could finally reach a good climb and "get into the game".

I hooked up with Paul south of the highway and then Paris and Mitch showed up. We shared a couple of climbs before Paris left us in the dust. Paul, Mitch, and I spent most of the day within sight of each other. Paul and Mitch got away from me south of Ocala when I had trouble unzipping to "dump ballast". I eventually caught up several climbs north of town over some large lakes.

Lauren, who was hoping to break the Florida women's record, couldn't get away from the field. She graciously agreed to take over Dave's duties and headed out with the truck.

The radio conversation was funny. Davis was the only pilot in the group had been in that area before. He and Belinda were constantly guiding their little goslings and answering questions like "Do I follow the 2 lane road to the northeast or the train tracks to the north?", "Can I go west of that big lake and still be out the airspace?", or "Did you go north or northwest at the at that little town?". We had very little of the normal "do you have something other there" type of conversation.

I really enjoyed the trip since I was flying over new territory. It was the first time I flew east of Gainsville. There were picturesque horse farms and of course lakes. We flew right over the runway where John Travolta keeps his flying toys.

Further north, Davis told us to not drift any further east since we were approaching restricted airspace around Jacksonville. I pushed further west to follow a little string of pearls popping up in the blue while Paul glided more northerly to a climb that Mitch was just finishing. Paul announced he had is first 100 mile flight in a flex wing. Paris announced he had his first flight to Georgia. Paul and I made a smooth cruised over a large prison, but I had an extra 2000 feet on him. Paul made a last-ditch search over a huge landfill he called "Mount Trashmore" while I pushed a little further north and found a climb while Paul was forced to land. Bummer.

The rest of the gang were getting further ahead as I tip-toed through a large expanse of pine plantations. Lots of trees, few LZs, no clouds, and little altitude. I thought the day was dying when I cruised over highway 10. I picked out a small construction site as my LZ. Mitch relayed my position to Belinda and Lauren. I didn't like my intended LZ so when I stumbled into light lift I started turning. That little climb progressively got better and I was soon at cloud base again.

About that time Belinda got on the radio and said that Davis had landed since his radio died. He was concerned that retrieval would be a pain if pilots continued on over the pine plantations that do not have cell phone coverage. He wanted everyone to land where he did to make pickup easy. I was about 12 miles away but had an easy glide at cloud base along a sea-breeze convergence line. I could see the Jacksonville skyline to my left. Paris gave me good visual landmarks while he circled down that led me right to the field. Davis certainly picked an interesting field to land in. Check out the picture for the image that greeted us. We had flown into Georgia but had landed back in Florida.

Paul and Lauren showed up before we finished packing. (Thanks very much Lauren for driving all the way to Georgia and being such a good sport about it). We all stopped for dinner and made it back to Quest a little after 11pm; not bad for a flight to Georgia.

Total distance 139 miles, airtime 5:45.

Quest and Back

The day started as usual at Wallaby Ranch with tandems and students flying in the mellow morning air. Gavin soloed this morning at the ripe old age of 15. Malcom told me this afternoon he bought his first glider, a Johnson Flex Wing, from Gavin's grandfather many years ago. (Another generation joins the growing line of hang gliding aviators and the previous generations feel a little bit older!)

The sky was filled with cummies by 11:00 and I was itching to go. My first tow behind Carlos was probably the roughest tow I've had in Florida. Once we cleared the tree line Carlos was above me, below me, to one side and then the other. I finally decided to release at 900 feet, figuring anything that can toss us around like that must have something I can climb in. Wrong! I was smashed to the ground in wicked sink and landed in turbulent air. Stevie came to my rescue with a cart and gave to a tow back to the launch line. Thanks Steve!

My second tow was sweet and Carlos dropped me off in a 700 fpm climb that went straight to cloud base. I floated around waiting for some other pilots to launch and climb out, but when they landed back at the ranch I decided to do some sightseeing.

I headed north along route 27 where I found an express elevator to the top floor near the 27 and route 192 intersection. I continued north until I came to the first of the big lakes. I originally hoped to go to the intersection of route 27 and route 50 but the blue around the lakes scared me off. The entire area west of the lakes was blue with the exception of some thin clouds and haze domes. I thought about turning around but decided to head northwest towards Quest; at least I could get a ride back to the ranch if I landed there. I saw a wispy form to the east and quickly raced to the forming cloud after I passed over the center of the runway. Meanwhile a tug pulled up a single surface glider to the same general area and a few moments later pulled one of the gray T2s up. (I later found out it was Kevin). Once at cloud base I waited for something to start forming on the other side of the blue before racing off. I hoped the other pilot in the T2 would follow me but he didn't. (Kevin was working with some students).

I shared a couple climbs with sailplanes at Seminole and then started my long slog upwind back to Wallaby. Once back into the clouds I never got low but made sure I didn't land behind locked gates in the quarries or one of the "forbidden" fields. However, I had a fairly easy time bouncing from cloud-to-cloud back to the ranch.

With the side trip to Seminole I flew a triangle 46 miles long. Total airtime for the day was a little over 3 hours.

Bok and Back

Wallaby Ranch came alive today as pilots showed up to grab airtime. The clouds trapped below the inversion level dissipated on schedule and cummies started forming around 10:30. I had a hard time waiting for everyone else to get ready but we eventually walked to the west end of the field.

I launched first, with Kerry as the tow pilot. I pinned off early in a good thermal to the south of the airfield. I immediately noticed all the gliders were moving to the northwest corner of the field. I stowed my bridal and played around at cloud base while the other pilots moved their gliders and launched.

Mick suggested flying an out-and-back to Bok Tower, the place Amy and I visited last week. It seemed like a reasonable thing to do so I joined in. Mick landed back at the field for a couple of reasons so only two of us actually headed out. I kept heading upwind to the east so that I could drift west if I got low and still be close to course line. My flying partner Billy took a direct line and initially was doing much better. However, he missed a climb, got down to 700 feet, and slowly clawed his way back up. Meanwhile I was floating along bouncing from cloud to cloud and eventually caught up and hung out at cloud base until we could hook up again. However on our very next glide I headed more upwind to the east and he headed on course to the southeast. Once again I got lucky and found a strong climb and pushed on.

The 24 mile trip south was slow but mostly uneventful. However I missed a climb on the other side of a blue hole and arrived at Bok Tower low enough to see the statues on the top. I was heading to an LZ downwind of the tower when I stumbled into a weak climb that slowly got me high enough to start my trip home.

I was low again over a shopping center that I just knew had to be producing a thermal. I was low but managed to find a weak climb that convinced some buzzards to leave the trees and join me. The flock worked together and soon one bird found the hot spot. I was the second to reach the thermal and the others join in below me. We all climbed together taking turns looking for better lift. At one point I had a buzzard about 6 feet off my wing and another 15 feet below me flying in perfect formation. Eventually my new friends headed east while I headed north.

Once again I found myself low looking for a climb over a concrete brick factory. I found lots of turbulence, but little lift. Although I was putting up a good fight, I was losing height. I finally gave up and headed for an LZ. I was flying the base leg of my approach over some power lines at 300 feet when, with no warning, I slammed into a bullet blasting up at 700 fpm. It was a "man your battle stations" moment as I wrestled with the "invigorating" climb. I soon reached cloud base and had a easy cloud-hopping glide back to the ranch.

The total round trip was slightly less than 50 miles and I flew for 3.5 hours, the same as yesterday.