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Saturday, 10/25/2014 [Weather] and [Flight Articles] by [Tim Barker] & [Sundowner] plus [SD Photo Set] [Neal] and [Misc Post]

Saturday, 10/25/2014
Leg 1 ~ 6.7 miles westbound from Skyport to the Painted Cave Windmill
Leg 2 ~ 17.4 miles eastbound to Carpinteria High School
total distance around 1 turn point ~ 24 miles
~ 2 1/2 hours airtime, Launch 12:26 and Land at 2:58 PM PDT
Trango

Sundowner's Flight Report, see also
[Weather Archive]  [Sat Photo Set]  [Google Earth KMZ Track]  [IGC Track Text File]

It had been 3 weeks since my last flight, so I was yearning for some airtime.  I wanted to fly both days, but could only budget one.  Was watching the forecast since mid week.  We were scheduled to get swiped by the tail end of a weak cold front spinning off a low pressure center to our north that was traveling ENE.  Most of the frontal moisture and cold air passed north of our location, but we did get some fun air with rapidly evolving conditions.

The forecast didn't look good enough to sound a general alarm.  I did conference with John Scott and played phone tag with TQ (Todd Quayle), but was on the fence despite jonesing to fly.  Conditions at dawn looked like the day might be ok.  The forecast was still calling for a weak lapse rate with a lot of cloudiness in the afternoon, but I didn't see the clouds on the satellite images.  The prefrontal SE wind along the ridge was a bit stiff at dawn, but it was forecast to back down.  I finally called Ron Faoro about 10 am and set up a 11:30 meet time at East Beach.  I had checked both the Eagle Site and Fly Above All for a bus schedule, but neither of them had posted a meet time.  I later saw Billy Jack's posting about Eagle's 10:30 meet time in the SBSA discussion thread, but Eagle's last posted announcement was for Thursday.

I was suppose to meet Bob Hurlbett at East Beach, but Cabrillo was closed for an event, so we left my Toyota in the shade at California Electric Supply off Milpas Street.  We checked on Debbie from Ron's computer when we got to his house, then left Bob's car at Parma before heading up in Ron's SUV.  Several hang gliders were loading and we were surprised to see numerous PG vehicles at Parma.  We spotted pilots launching on our way up.  They all appeared to get up easily at launch.  We passed the Eagle van heading down just before we arrived at the Skyport a little past noon.

Airborne at 12:26 and climbed 550 feet in 4 turns to 3,500 for an easy transition to the RnR, which worked ok, but only got to 4K.  Despite marginal altitude for an uphill jump the downwind connection through buoyant air to EJ's was easy.  Came in a on the spine a little below launch and worked up over takeoff with the intention of top landing, but I was too high on both my approach attempts.  There was very little wind, so I would have needed to get further behind the hill.  Opted to skip the top landing and boated over toward La Cumbre Peak.  Had to zig up from several hundred below, but it was buoyant and easy.  Could only get about a hundred over the Peak and left even along the back ridge to boat over to the Alternator.  Found plenty of glide extenders spooning the bowl on the way over and was able to stay within a hundred feet of ridge line without stopping.  Searched into the saddle a ways and found a smooth thermal drifting light from the SW.  Got to just under 4,700, my max altitude for the day, climbing up from 3,700 in 8-1/2 turns.

Did one turn at No-Name for a hundred foot gain, but opted to keep going and climbed over the VOR spine from 33 hundred back to 4K in light drift from the south.  I normally prefer to have a bit more altitude before reaching into San Marcos Pass for the windmill at Painted Cave, but the glides had been good with minimal drift so I kept going and rounded the windmill with 3200.

Got down to 2900 plugging upwind back to the point behind the saddle but was rewarded at the point with a nice 700 foot climb to 36 for an easy transition back to the VOR spine.  Got there above the spine with 2,800 and climbed back into the mid 4s, drifting light from the SSW.  No luck over No-Name again.  Since the glides had been good, I opted to angle for the back of the saddle behind Westbowl, but half way there my glide deteriorated so I angle to intercept the west side of West Bowl.  I came in behind the front ridge a little below the spine that runs back toward the peak, thinking I'd be able to find something to get me above the spine, but I was lee side in flow from the SE.  Must have been a draw from a thermal breaking off somewhere.  A little white knuckled getting around the corner of the spine running to the SW.  Made a couple of aborted attempts to run at the spine only to be blown off into the continuing light lee side sink.  Finally got on the spine with 3K (plenty to spare) and tracked back up to the 4K over the peak.

Opted to jump back across the saddle to the Alternator because I'd gotten my max altitude there 45 minutes earlier, and there was a HG getting 500 over at La Cumbre Peak.  Did ok on the glide and got to Camino Cielo about even with the Alternator launch, but couldn't find anything going up.  Came limping back to Westbowl below the top and had to go around the peak.  Chose the west side and got back on the ridge, but could only climb back to 38.  Took it and left for Cathedral.  Got there with 3,150, but the best I could do was 3,250 after 4 turns, so I went fishing east and kept going for Tunnel Tit from a little below the front peak at Cathedral   Got to Tunnel Tit with 2,750 and struggle to get up to 31 hundred for a jump back across the saddle to the RnR.

The wind was now light from the west, and there was a little drift away from the hill on glides.  Despite the minimal wind, it seemed to be getting the better of the thermals.  The drift was from the west across the spine.  I struggled to get back to almost 3,400, but finally flushed back out to Tunnel Tit where I found a real thermal and climbed from 3K to 3,400 in 4-1/2 turns.  Came in ok at the Thermal Factory with 2,850, but spent 10 minutes and countless turns trying to bench up.  The best I could do was 3,150.

My earlier thinking was that the forecasted channel wind wasn't going to materialize since it was still glassy at 11:30, but somewhere around Westbowl I heard reports on the radio about stiff west wind building near the beach.  The wind in the mountains was light from the west.  Not very strong, but enough to flatten the weak thermal trajectory and break them up.  I was concerned that with building wind on the water the conditions would continue to deteriorate.  I was actually sort of stuck.  Not able to get much over 3K at the Thermal Factory, I was too low to run for Shadow Peak, but there was some urgency to make progress eastbound to stay ahead of potential wind building from the west, so I took the only option I had and went SE to Parkers.

Did ok following the back of the bowl over to Parkers and got there with 2,500 but didn't initially find anything.  Most of the thermals had been drifting with a shallow trajectory from the west, so I went fishing on the east side and promptly got spanked by a sharp edge.  Lost control of the canopy but finally got back in rhythm after a surging recovery from a twisty asymmetrical stall.  Steered the canopy back into the strong lift and climbed from 2,500 to 2,800 in 6 turns, extending my upwind leg as much as I dared before turning downwind to run for the points in front of Montecito Peak.

Found some buoyant air at 2,200 over the west points, but not enough to turn on so I kept dolphining along toward the east point.  Came in a little under 2K, gun shy about scratching in close due to the lurking air sharks, but there was some wind from the west so I turned left into the hill and was able to zip up a few hundred feet to ridge line and latch onto a good thermal that went to almost 3,800 drifting from the SW.  Made some spaghetti over the Ramero Road Cut, arriving with 2,900 and finally leaving on the 2nd pulse with 3,650.

Couldn't get established along Castle Ridge and had to fall off to Castle Point, getting there with 2,300.  Traced more spaghetti and finally left a little shy of 2,800.  There are 5 Castle Points below Castle Ridge.  From west to east they are numbered Castle 1 through 5.  The old timers named Castle Ridge and the Castle Points after a never ending construction project on the west side of the 2nd point, which we call "Castle Point".  The next point east (the 3rd point) is called Mobile Point.  In the 80s the area was only sparsely populated, but there has been tons of development over the past 30 years, so it is likely more retrievable now.  Anyway, I angled toward Mobile Point (the next point east), but my drift on glide was from the NW.  I likely had enough altitude to shoot the gap between Polo Ridge and Snowball if I went with the flow, but if I angled against the flow for Mobile Point and didn't get back up, I'd likely be landing out.  Based on the radio chatter and the now obvious large white caps on the ocean, the wind was a concern.  When I'd gotten over 36 at Ramero I considered trying to run around the west side of Polo Ridge for the Polo Fields, but I wasn't confident about where I'd hit the obviously stronger ocean wind, so I opted to play for Castle Ridge instead, hoping that if I could get a little further east I might get ahead for the wind and be able to fly out toward Bates.  Committing toward Mobile Point might keep that notion in play, but I reminded myself that I'm married with kids and I had a tentative afternoon commitment to watch my son's girl friend's tennis match at the Santa Barbara Municipal Courts later in the afternoon.  I opted to play it conservative and go with the flow, easily clearing the last foothill to shoot the gap and reach over to the west spine of Snowball.

Snowball was buoyant and good for a turn, but there was a little more west wind than in the mountains.  Not nearly as much wind as the beach, but enough to lay the thermals over into an unrealistic trajectory, which might work for a few turns, but with the wind across the flutes there wasn't a good downwind drift path.  Flew out to the high school with enough to perhaps reach El Carro Park or Canalino School, but landing at the high school looked pretty easy and I suspected I'd likely encounter more wind by venturing closer to the ocean.  Threw out the anchor with about 500 MSL (about 400 AGL) for an easy landing on the front lawn.

Ron and Bob showed up about 5 minutes after touch down.  There was an occasional bluster up to 8 or 9 knots, but we were mostly sheltered from the wind.  Considered stuffing the glider and running for Bates, but the manicured grass and light breeze were ideal so we opted to pack up.  I was in the bag within 15 minutes of touchdown.  Ron had landed at Padaro Beach backing up in a lot of wind so he opted to use the grass lawn to fold his glider also.  Bob had landed on the grass at Cold Springs School after he had trouble clearing a crevat over Montecito.  Bob had gotten back to his car at Parma and ran chase for us.  We asked one of the high school students snap a few amigo photos before heading over to Bates for an evaluation.

The velocity at Bates seemed good, but the direction was cross.  Pilots had been flying earlier with full size wings.  We watched Chris Grantham launch a small speed wing and he sunk out on the main cliff.  Bob and Ron dropped me at my car on their way up to collect Ron's SUV from the Skyport.  Got to the tennis match midway through the first set.  Odessa lost that one 5/7.  She was up 4/1 in the next set, but faltered and never won one another game.  She won her first match in the morning and was paired against a strong contender for her 2nd round.

Reflections

Not a stellar day, but unique and colorful with spectacular views and some easy air early, but also technically challenging conditions later in the day that required pilots to engage.  Was good to share the experience with my amigos.

Didn't fly very efficient from a race perspective.  Traced a lot of spaghetti on my track log.  Getting a late start, I had already forfeited going through Casitas Pass and elected to poke around without a clear objective until I realized the day was deteriorating and I needed to make progress toward Carpinteria to avoid the west wind sweeping through.  In my experience it is better to be a little early to launch and wait a half hour compared to arriving late and scrambling to catch up.  Thinking that Sunday might be better, I was late to pull the trigger on Saturday.

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