Ron Faoro (The Spin Doctor)

Friday, 2/17/06
Skyport to La Cumbre Peak to Bates
16 miles (LFSD points 14)

It's hard to pay attention to demands at work when there's a 30 degree lapse rate beckoning one to the mountains (as there is again this Friday morning!).  That was the case yesterday when I looked at the weather in the morning.  The wind had been blowing 30-40 mph all night long at Montecito Peak and my home in Sycamore Canyon was certainly rocking Wednesday night.  But Debbie was saying light northwest winds and Montecito Peak backed off at 9 AM.  So I called Andy Palmer and we set up a later meet time of 10:45.  There went all my plans of what I needed to do at work and around the house.

Diablo launched as the Eagle crew drove up to Skyport.  Our timing was pretty good; the place turned on around 11.  I got up to 3,500 at launch, 5,500 at the R&R - but La Cumbre Peak was too rowdy when I got there and I came back east with 4,700 feet.  Passed over Skyport and fished around in the turbulent conditions at the Thermal Factory before finding a core that drew me up to the back ridge and cloudbase at 6,500 feet.  It was worth enduring the shakes and snaps to get this kind of altitude.  My GPS died and I changed batteries on the way east.  It was very cold; you had to be dressed for the freezing temperatures.

Passed over Montecito Peak and San Ysidro Canyon and came in over the top of the ridge before Romero Canyon.  It had been rather smooth on the glide, but now I was back in the washing machine.  The high clouds had moved in strong enough to shut down some of the thermal activity.  All that was left were the little ratty ones, keeping me pegged below 4K.  There was a 7-8 mph west wind and it was one of those days where you had a choice of either falling out of the thermal into nasty air or just popping on down to the next lift source.  So, in no time I was at the east end of Castle Ridge.  My enthusiasm for the Pass was on the wane.  Not so much because of the thrashing around as because of the low altitudes I was getting.

After working to get up to 4,400 feet at the powerlines, while the west wind tried to throw me into no man's land, I headed out.  Diablo was only at East Divide and the skies were pretty gray.  I fought the southerly component of the wind and was thinking I might land on the backside of Carpinteria rather than my intended LZ of Bates.  But I caught a huge thermal in the middle of nowhere halfway to Carp and got back up to 4,400 feet once again.  Easy glide to Bates. Came in with 1,500 feet and thought about flying to Ventura.  The wind was southwest at about eight mph - it likely would have increased as I made my way toward Ventura.  But I opted for getting back to work and salvaging some time.

Ben and his girlfriend, Ashley, picked me up and we went with Andy to Caje' for a smoothie.  Then back to Parma.

16 miles. One hour forty-five minutes.