“Go to Cruise” Dec, 2011

Sometimes you have projects that just never seem to get done. Mine…. putting together of a “little video” that captures the spirit of our favourite flying site in Mansfield Washington.

I had plenty of excuses that contributed to not getting the project done. Thing is, I truly believed we had something worth showing off and sharing with the flying community but I could never satisfactorily capture it with the quality it deserved.

Then along came the GoPro sports camera. A filming tool for idiots. Quite frankly, its an amazingly simple piece of video equipment. Just turn it on and “roll camera”. Its strength is the high quality wide angle image that is captured by this simple point and shoot video camera. On the other hand, It’s only weakness turns out to be its high quality wide angle image! (IMO), the wide angle field of view is pretty much the sole purpose of this camera. Well this image can be breathtaking…. after a while it becomes boring. Kind of like riding a roller coaster? Once a year is a thrill?……. continuously, over and over? becomes a bit fatiguing. So, how to use it and take advantage of its strengths? Keep it short, keep the tempo fast, and never dwell on any given shot for prolonged period of time.

With lots of material hogging almost 40gig on my hard drive, I still had one more excuse/hurtle to overcome. I need a computer that would not spit sparks trying to render the massive files that the GoPro produces. It was time for an upgrade. Dell XPS15z, Intel i7, 8gigs of ram and 2gigs of dedicated video…. bundled with Adobe video editor (simple enough that even I could figure it out!).

To inspire a tight script I decided on a sound track that doesn’t give the viewer time to think… just enjoy the view.

In my opinion …. it appeared to work. (BTW, the title?…”Go to Cruise”?….. it is the first command the pilot uses to begin the take-off roll…..)

To view the film, please go to my Vimeo link to watch in HD.

"Go to Cruise"

Cheers

Last Kick at the Can, Part 2:

Sept 4th (Sunday). Hot and Blue, no wind.

My turn to run the rig but both Mia and Mike where un-inspired. With a little prodding, I convinced Mia to at least tow up the PG and got Mike to act as a "Spotter". 

We found a nice spot on L-Road where Mia could layout the PG  in some cut stubble and not on the road.  I'm still a little rusty on towing PG's and have not gotten a perfect technique figured out so I really like having a second set of eyes on the ground to "spot" the takeoff sequence. As it turned out, Mia took a frontal on her first attempt (came up a little too quick and she failed to "check it") so she had a short "dirt surf" .... bounced up and had just got in the air as I shut down the tow. Her next attempt (in near zero winds) was much better and she was up clean. 

Mia was hitting strong lift on tow and decided to pin off at only 700agl... almost connected but soon drifted in a very light south wind back to the start and landed. 

Her second attempt was much smoother but again, pinned of early (less then 800ft agl?). This time she successfully scratched her way up to 5000ft asl (3000ft agl) and decided she was going to try and make the 14km flight over to Mansfield her goal for the day. 

Mike and I set out on a "low speed pursuit" and watched her make several saves low out of the dirt but never getting that high. Mia said the air was plenty active and she was choosing to fly supper conservative for the whole flight.  Eventually she managed to do the glide into town, landed in a wild grass strip near the house where Mike helped carry her gear back to the front lawn. 

Victory.... Mia claims her first goal flight on the PG!

Nice breaking down on the green grass of home! Ended the day with a trip to Chelan for swim and dinner.

Sept 5th (Monday), You guessed it... Blue and Hot!

Same theme as yesterday, except my turn to be the Paragliding "victim" and Mia was running the rig. Mike still not enthusiastic about rigging the VR for a hot sweaty grind agreed to crew as "spotter" again.  Jeff on his RS also decided to join us, hoping to scratch out a flight on his hang.

With a little better procedures, I managed to successfully tow with my first attempt. I completed a 1400ft agl tow but despite having dusty's kicking off all over the place managed to drive through what ever lift that was there down to the start point.  (My excuse?... vario was acting up ;-)

A little bit of drama on my second tow with a blown weak link just as I pulled up.  No big deal, new weak link and I gave it another shot. This time it was nice launch and again a strong tow. Even more dust devils in the area but still was not able to connect. Admittedly, I felt a bit intimidated with the sight of devils cracking off in the area and decided that conditions where getting potentially above my comfort zone so I called it a day.

Jeff saddled up on the tow rig just after 1pm and took a nice tow directly into lift and was up and away. His goal was 30km south to Park Lake and the golf course LZ. It was a slow grind, only breaking 6000ft asl on one occasion. Mia, Mike and I backtracked to Mansfield with the tow rig, picked up some swimming gear and eventually took up chase with the lake as goal.  We stopped in Saint Andrews to monitor Jeff's progress. Eventually we got the go-ahead to head to the lake as Jeff had it on glide.  

Jeff styled a nice landing at west side fairway

Again... dip in the lake, beer and slow trip back up to Mansfield to finish the day where we packed up the rigid's for the trip back home. Not our last trip of the year but it signalled what was the end of summer for this year. (heading home...)   :-( 

Last Kick at the Can (Sept 1st to 5th) Part 1:

The good old September Long weekend is always a mixed bag. This year, the forecast looked promising.... perhaps too promising as a big high pressure was building onto the coast and I figured there was a very high probability of things stabling out.  Still, any airtime is better then anytime spent at work!

Sept 1st (Thursday), the high was still building in and the Jet Stream was driving straight down over Washington State.  Big winds on the ground, monster dust devils eating up the dirt  so flying was not in the cards.

After we got our acre of lawn cut, Mia was in a shopping mood. She had been eyeing up a good deal on a bicycle (fancy road bike) so it was off to REI in Spokane, where she picked up a nice little Cannondale Synapes... strange tho... no peddles.... apparently that required further research ?.... On the return trip to Mansfield, passed an old "red neck" in a Toyota pickup. The canopy and tailgate was plastered with all the usual right wing slamming of Obama. We stopped in Davenport to do some shopping and the truck was there in the lot, so I walked around it checking out the political statement when I noticed in the top left corner of the rear a small decal that read "Free Tibet"... left me thinking, America, "land of the political extremes" .

Sept 2nd (Friday). Well I guess I blew this call. We woke up to strong 30km North winds, forecasts all indicated pretty much blown out for the day so we decided to go on a road trip with Mike from Spokane down to what the locals call Saddle Mountain about 100km due south of Mansfield (north facing 2000 ft ridge site). We took our PG's.  Turns out the forecast was shit, and it was only light east up on launch. Still Mia and I got to get a little ridge flying in (I managed one touch and go top landing attempt), Mike did not bother to setup the ATOS as it was way too lame to make the effort.

Meanwhile, back at Chelan Butte we could hear some fellow Canadians (Alex and Rob) working on a 70km OR over Mansfield (Mike heard something on the radio about watering our lawn from the air by some smart ass....). Oh well, explored a new site. 

Sept 3rd (Saturday), Hot and blue... not looking great but we decided not to blow the call and committed to some aviation.  Mia was crewing the rig, Mike (ATOS VR) and Jorge (Light Speed) from Spokane joined us.  Still NE on the ground... I towed up first and much to my skeptical  surprise, connected into a smooth 2oofpm up... real smooth.... down right pleasant. I knew it was going to be a soft day so after hitting 5500 ft asl (3500 over) I headed cross wind to the south (in what had turned into 10mph east wind aloft). Despite what was a very slow go and plenty of low saves (like when I dug myself out of the dirt north of Douglas) it turned into a very nice day.  At the end of the day I landed back at the tow site (to retrieve Jorge's truck) for a 114km FAI triangle. Meanwhile, Mike had completed  a 86km FAI triangle and Jorge had flown a OR west of Withrow and back to join Mike on the grass on the front lawn in Mansfield.  Beer and steak dinner... life is good.  (Oh... getting even for the bad call the day before.... the Butte was blown out..... would never have guessed that, must have been "karma"?)

August 21st....

In search of the elusive "two thumbs up" it was my turn to run the tow rig.  Today's judges would be  Mia and Mike B (from Spokane).

We had a real mish-mash of weather forecasts with the only constant being they all agreed it was going to be hot (mid to upper 90's F).  To that end we decided to go with the NOA soaring numbers (Spokane Soaring Forecast ) that called for light winds (with a morning northerly) and good lift up 10,000asl.

Mia was ready to tow at 1pm and with a 5-10 mph north wind, we started from L-Roads mid point setup.  From midpoint, we don't have as much road as we like but there is the option to cross the highway for an additional 1 mile..... with Mia checking for traffic (our own "eye in the sky") I got clearance to cross the highway. Mia only used a few additional yards then pinned off into lift and was soon climbing out.  Mike also towed north but decided to pin off without making me cross the highway .  For his reward, he proceeded to immediately sink out!... Personally, I thought he was just trying to show off his low save skills as he saved his flight by doing some dirt tango at 580ft agl, connecting and climbing out. 

Both pilots drifted south, describing the air as broke but regularly breaking through 7000ft asl.  At about 20km out, the number improved to 8000ft+, all in the blue (no Q's). Mia was first to decide to cross to toward Farmer (In the mean time, Mike continued south to our JBSR turnpoint on top of the Beezly hills).  After having returned the tow rig to Mansfield I was dutifully pursuing my team around the course in our trusty air conditioned Jetta Diesel Wagon...

Both pilots picked their way back to the tow site in light broken condition, occasionally getting over 9000ft asl.  Of course, by the time they arrived back at L-Road, the nice smooth wind that had been blowing ALL day, had dropped to nothing (Light and Vacuum... and hot). Landing in these conditions is a real challenge but both Mia and Mike, after more then 4 hours each in the air, did admirable jobs pulling off clean "nose up" landings.  For there reward... both were immediately served ice cold Becks beer from the ice filled cooler!

Mia's 92km FAI Triangle and Mikes 107 km FAI Triangle

Mikes Video of his flight:

I think I earned myself the double thumbs up for service. To be safe I also tossed in a trip to Lake Chelan for an evening swim and bought everybody dinner... man they are a tough crowd to please! My happy campers:

31 years.....

I'm married to a saint, Celebrating our 31'st anniversary the tradition of Johnny Walker Blue in Mansfield continues.

  With Hot stable looking air on the coast Mia and blasted over the Cascades for 2 days dirt and dust devils. NOA soaring is predicting some very nice blue conditions... XC skies ....not so much, we will see (I crew for Mia).

Last Flight (for this trip, August 13th)

Nothing inspirational in the forecast. Blue, south winds and only only a marginal soaring forecast.  Since we got blown out yesterday, we thought we should at least put in the effort.

Today when we arrived at the tow site, winds where way less then the previous day. There were some big dust devils in the neighbourhood but not as many in previous days.  Randy was expecting the wind to pick up, but I was hoping we could still do some flying so I rigged and was up on the truck before 1pm.

Mia delivered me down the tow road directly into some 1200fpm up while on tow.  I was near 1000ft agl when I pinned off. Of course as soon as I pinned off, the lift was gone?..... a quick downwind search and I was back into it and was climbing in a smooth 400fpm.  I found the lift surprisingly smooth, but there was definitely some drift (10-14mph out of the south), By the time I peaked out at 7600ft asl, I had drifted 3 km's north.  I decided that I would press directly south.

Heading south, given the winds, pretty much kept me in the thermal source/street. I managed slow progress south for about 20km's, consistently being able to top up and continue. (Randy decided that given my ATOS was having a slow go, he didn't bother to setup) . At the 20km mark, the bottom fell out and I could find no more thermals to further my progress. I landed after a brief unsuccessful attempt to pull off  a low save (drifting north 5km's in the process at less then 3500ft asl... or 800ft agl).

My short little XC.

After packing up, Mia and I headed back to Mansfield, picked up Randy and headed for one last trip Park Lake.  Later, Mia created a fantastic fish dinner on the barbeque. Life is good.

Sunday, August 14th looked like the weather was going to change for the worse, so this was our last flight for this trip. We expect to be back for an extended September Long Weekend... perhaps the weather God's will smile for that trip?

Will try to get a photo album up in the next few days along with a  whole bunch of GoPro footage.

Blown Out... (August 12th)

Didn't look to0 bad first thing in the morning but by the time we got to the tow site the devils where drifting at a pretty good speed from the south. The airspeed on the truck was 10-15mph... you can pretty much count on 20 -25 aloft so we called the day.

Randy for some deep R+R....

Mia catching up on the Laundry....

I worked on the Winch, trying to work out some bugs....

Weekend weather not looking good.