Saturday 1/5/13 [Weather] and [Flight Articles] by [Mark Pratt] & [Sundowner]

Mark Pratt (aka Nitrous)
Saturday, 1/5/13

Article copied from: http://scpa.info/bb/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2743

Oat Mountain to St. Thomas Aquinas College
2 and a quarter hours.

I've always enjoyed reading the write ups of the flights on the SCPA, so I will try to write up some.

Launched about 11am into a light SE.  Lost 2 or 3 hundred feet looking for lift and only finding sink.  Light tail wind with massive sink until I crossed the Sespe.  Flow was already going upstream as I crossed the river.  Arrived at ridge with 1500 feet.  I have never been able to make it to Santa Paula peak with that low of a crossing.  Very weak bubbles off of several rocky ledges.  I felt like I was a new born piglet hanging on to its mothers tit.  My Trango 2XC can sure suck up those small light thermals.  I felt like I just learning to fly all over again.  Stuck for about 30 min before I could climb the ridge and get across the small saddle that goes up the back of San Cayetano peak.

Overcast sky making climbs very slow and narrow.  Finally got even with the peak and maintained altitude until the ridge before Santa Paula Peak.  Lots of sink and practice using the speed bar.  Bubbles over the oil Fields at 3.3k got me to almost to the ridge line with 4K.  I always chicken out at this point and turn around and go home, except for the one time I was way high and had a tail wind.  My options.

1. Head to Boyd's, a long into the wind glide.
2. Head up the ridge line to Pucker's, with no good LZ if I have to crawl back.
3. Follow the ridge down and try to get established on the Sulfer Mountain Ridge.

I tried option #3 and found no lift and had to come back to the collage to land.

It was a day of watching my wingtips and feet just clearing the bushes. I love my new Trango 2 XC.  I would have not been able to get out of Fillmore without it.  I think the mistake that I made was giving up, I should have stayed as high on the ridge behind the college as I could and waited for the light clouds to thin.  If I could have gotten another 5 hundred feet... may have been able to make the crossing to the Puckers ridge.  Can't wait until I learn how to fly my new glider.

Nitrous