After nearly 3 years away from Mansfield it was the perfect conditions to get back in air.
There has been plenty of windy unstable weather around but there was a brief window, a day where light winds, low chance of overdevelopment. Mia stepped up to run the rig (the best tow op in World!)
The glider, harness, rig had not changed during the Covid time out but I tossed in the usual long list of little changes that could create some challenge. After all, at the base of the tow system is our 1990 Ford F150... you never know when its going to have a snit (like its owner). We have a new towline recovery chute, new Bluetooth headset system in my kit, some toasty electric gloves that I have never used, a Garmin InReach Mini GPS tracker, first time I've used an Android backup (running XC Tracker)... it was cold so I layered up and was like a stuffed sausage in my harness.
Conditions turned out to be perfect for a "low drama" flight. Managed a nice 180km FAI in 5 hours, L-Road to Wilson Creek, up past Wilbur to Sherman and managed to pick my way back across the top to L-Road (lift was dying and a headwind was picking up). Top of lift for most of the flight was 8000 asl, tho I did manage 10,000 late in the day. Radio with its BT headset worked perfect. I fired up the Electric gloves a few times, they kept the cool air from freezing the fingers. Being stuffed tight into the Rotor harness left the Butt lever not working well "butt" I managed ;-).
The Garmin InReach failed to track the flight? Not sure what was up with that, thought I turned tracking on but? Guess its back to the "manual" to see what step I missed.
Thought it was going to be an easy landing with pretty good breeze at L-Road but it thermal blocked just as I turned final, botched my landing and skidded in like a Euro, no harm to the glider but did manage to tweak my shoulder. Oh well. (Looks like Motrin, Ice, Heat and Scotch for a few days).
I've decided to end my participation in the OLC (DHV, PG and such... ), Plenty of reasons for this change but mainly it comes down to not wanting to be part of a "game". Going to shift over to personal goals. If people want to read about our flying in central Washington it will be their choice. Hopefully this SeeYou snap will work (as a flight summary)? I do have a online log book with OLC server, might post the link at a later date.
Thank You to Mia for crewing for this one, I hope to return the favor!
For now, it looks like it's going to be a bunch of windy blustery weather for the next week. Likely won't get big bird back into the air until end of June. Felt nice to get some airtime....
Cheers
