skyport wednesday

[andy dainsberg]

Hazy with a chance of OD, Chris G, Chris P and I had setups from padaro to fillmore… 2 vans, lots of pilots and it was great to see Chadcito out flying solo. Aaron was off quickly and seemed go everywhere- and it was decent out front early- as cloud base slowly lifted. Some of us waited past noon… Several pilots were doing well and heading downrange; but I was not flying very well, waiting low @ thermal factory for it to produce (it didn’t) while other xc pilots were using front points to Montecito...

I didn’t get decent alt or glide at all until I got to/past Romero. By then, things seemed to be going better! Stronger cores and the SE was turning SW. The pass still seemed possible and my only thought was catching CP… -By this time CG and others(?) were out to Padaro and CP was past the power lines.- For me it seemed a long slog from castle to the power lines and once I was there I could barely stay over them, maxing out @4 in the blue -between the white @ 39. Base was low and I could not get high enough- and that was pretty frustrating, yet mucho inspiring when your buddy is making it work!~ I couldn’t even see CP; he was past Divide… No mojo for me at the lines, so I backtracked, tanked up and flew out to the field near bates.

Testify y‘all!

[Chris G]

Really fun day despite the lower than optimal cloud base! It was great to see so many folks going down range. We need to do that WAY more often.

[Aaron]

si! si! super fun day, conditions were great! cloudbase was low threes early on, got started in front of the antenna farm and headed over to holy hills, got to cloudbase and chased jah lyon to cathedral on his pg(he was gettin around all over the place, not bad for a hang glider dude ;0 ), i didnt get much there so just kept going to westbowl, and worked the east side up to cloudbase. the darkness at that time extended more over town to the west so turned around. a couple updrafts here and there sent me onto the front of montecito where i met up with tyronious and boated along. past romero cloudbase was more 4ish and working at every spine. however we flaundered around the powerline ridge and couldnt find nuttin, yar!! i've flushed a ton there on my hg too, whats the secret to that frickin spot?? once we were below it we went on a magical glide to bates/rincon beach. thanks to the eagle van for swoopin us up, we snagged bob p. and carl at padaro who had his first xc flight. nice work carl! amazing day! fun flying with all the work skippin hoodlems!

cp where did you end up?

[Chris G]

I've gotten through the Powerlines, and Whiteledge more than a few times by just "moving on". If you keep pushing you'll eventually hit something. Sitting in the same place waiting for it is usually a losing battle. Of course I ended up in the bushes below Whiteledge by pushing on too low so WTF do I know...heh

I'll let CP post his report but he made it a hell of a lot farther than we did!

[ChrisP]

Those are good descriptions of the day. I did the same thing..got to the powerlines and floundered with ~4k. It didn't seem like a good decision to keep going, but I was still tempted to. Eventually I got caught on the wrong side and my decision was made for me! I came into Noon with 32, but it was working to cloudbase of 45. Same thing at West Divide. White Ledge had a cloud forming over the top, but I arrived too low to work anything. There were a few pops, but every time I turned, I lost more than I gained. Kept going, though, and cleared the saddle in the fireroad with ~200. After that, there was some at least some upslope flow along the ridge. Eventually got over the top of the ridge, and crossed the gap to the Nuthouse, arriving 50' over launch. Made it back to 4k over Spine 1. Ojai was still working, but I felt I had pressed my luck enough. Landed at the high school, where Chris G met me with retrive (Thanks!.. I owe you guys!). Really fun to have a crowd going downrange on a Wednesday.

[andy dainsberg]

awesome cp. all things considered on the day, i can testify truthfully to the amount of work and -go for it attitude- it took to pull off that flight