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Friday, 12/26/2014 [Weather] and [Flight Articles] by [flychild] [Aaron] [Marty] [Dadam] [NMERider] & [Sundowner]
plus [Track Log & Photo Index] for the extended weekend

Friday, 12/26/2014
Flt 1 (Tom & Peter) Leg 1 ~ 7.4 miles Antenna Farm (after launching from the Skyport) to the Painted Cave Windmill
Flt 1 (Tom & Peter) Leg 2 ~ 7.5 miles Painted Cave Windmill to landing at Parma
Flt 1 total distance around 1 turn point ~ 15 miles
~ 1 hour 32 minutes airtime, Launch at 10:37:30, Land at 12:09:59 PST
Flt 2 (Tom and Stephan) Leg 1 ~ 25.5 miles Skyport to Nordhoff Ridge
Flt 2 (Tom and Stephan) Leg 2 ~ 3.2 miles Nordhoff Ridge to Nordhoff High School
Flt 2 total distance around 1 turn point ~ 28.7 miles
Combined Distance of both flights around 1 turn point each ~ 43.7 miles
Bantoo

Sundowner's Flight Report, see also [Weather Archive]
and SD's 3D Google Earth [KMZ] file or [Flt 1] & [Flt 2] IGC Data File and SD's [Photos]

Hadn't flown in 3 weeks due to work obligations but I'd been watching the weather for a few days as a cold front approached with the potential for a strong lapse rate.  An inversion provided protection from strong upper level winds and the weather unfolded similar to the computer model predictions.

Was up well before dawn on Friday checking the indicators.  Spoke with Jonathan and made arrangements for collection via Max's truck.  They met me in Carpinteria about 8:30 and we were at East Beach before 9am.  Loaded 8 pilots in Max's truck before stopping by Parma as the Eagle Bus was strapping a light load to the roof.  The Rock was light up and the Bypass mostly calm.  It coming in ok when we got to the Skyport a little before 9:45.  No need to go higher because the day would be working good down low.  The Eagle Bus showed up a few minutes after our arrival.

It seemed like it should be soarable with reasonable cycles coming in.  Peter and I were off tandem at 11:37, but didn't get up at launch.  Got a good glide and went through the gap between the lower SE point on the Factory and the power lines.  The spine up to the point was buoyant, but the point wasn't giving it up, so we fizzled down to the Antenna Farm where we found out first thermal for an 11 turn climb from 2500 to 4100, which was higher than the pilots groveling at launch and the RnR.  Since the pilots in the back were hanging on, but not getting to our altitude, we opted to head west rather than benching up to the Thermal Factory.  Used a thousand feet on the glide to Tunnel Tit, arriving with 3100.  No joy, so we searched out the SW spine before eventually falling all the way back to the Round House for a reboot.

Took awhile making spaghetti at the Round House and Antenna Farm before we were able to finally bench up to the Thermal Factory and get on course westbound.  Everyone was getting to good altitude by now.  Heard pilots reporting 6200 westbound off to the west.  Got to 5900 at La Cumbre Peak and 4900 at the VOR before gliding to the Pained Cave Windmill.  Peter got some video of Aaron on his new wing over Pained Cave as we crossed paths with his group as they were coming back from Lizard's Mouth.  Peter had been cold since getting high at La Cumbre Peak.  He had all the high tech clothing, but didn't layer up.  I was hoping he might warm up down lower as we rounded the windmill with 38 and dolphined eastbound, but he was soaked to the bone.  The glides were buoyant, so we just kept going.  Needed to tank up a tad at Westbowl to reach Cathedral, so we did 3 turns, climbing from 31 to 3800, but continued to climb after exiting the core and topped out over 4K on glide, higher than we wanted to be to make Parma.

Our goal now was to get down ASAP and warm Peter up.  I was hoping to throw some more clothes on Peter and continue on a 2nd flight.  Found some sink to turn in over Saint Mary's and finally got down with a good  landing at Upper Parma.  12:10 PM.

Walked the gear to the road, and Peter called Stephan, an intermediate pilot visiting from Switzerland.  Stephan had flown to Parma earlier in the day and was now at his hotel by the beach.  Peter gave Stephan the sales pitch and he was going to take a cab back to Parma, but by the time we got the gear stuffed in the back of the Batmobile he was still was trying to find a cab, so we drove down to his hotel to collect him at the beach.  Back up to the Skyport and we were airborne on the 2nd pull at 1:26 PM

Got a couple hundred over at launch and took it to the Thermal Factory, gaining a hundred on the glide over.  Climbed from 3200 to 38 in a shallow trajectory thermal drifting from the SSW.  From there we skipped along eastbound, getting to 38 at Montecito Peak and 4K at Ramero, but not wanting to spend to much time climbing.  The thermals along Castle Ridge were mostly coming off the lee side (east side) and drifting, so we would mostly just do one or 2 turns or dolphined through them.  Did stop a the west end of Powerline ridge to climb from 37 to over 4K and went of the east end of Powerline Ridge with 42 for the Trapezoid in front of Noon Peak.

Got to Noon Peak about 2:12 and got stuck fishing for what seemed like a long time around 4K, but it turned out to be only 7 or 8 minutes before something finally pulsed through and we climbed 4800 drifting from the SW, so we were in good position to connect to West Divide where we achieved our max altitude just under 5400.  Skipped East Divide and came in midway up on the SW spine of Whiteledge.  Didn't sense any thermal draw so we kept going.  Did a few figure 8s along the SE spine and went around the corner.  Made a play for Bump 3 but we arrive on the SW side a little low (2900) and left with 3100 because we didn't like the air and though we could reach the Nuthouse on a dolphin glide, which we did, coming in about 50 feet over launch.

Did about 5 figure 8 passes before centering a thermal for another 5 turns that got us a couple hundred over ridge line.  Hit 4100 over Spine One and went to the middle bump on Nordhoff Ridge.  It was after 3 o'clock and  getting late in the day with only about an hour and a half before sunset at 4:42.  Neal was on his way back from Puckers after hearing Aaron's report of stiff east wind blowing offshore down the Santa Clara River.  We spotted Neal climbing from 31 to 48 over the Stooges.  The late day air was mellowing and we could only get to 37 in our 6 minute fishing expedition.  We might have been able to reach Twin Peaks and possibly Upper Ojai, but Aaron and Tavis were at the High School and Neal was working his way back.  If we went around the corner we likely wouldn't be able to make it back upwind westbound, so we opted to backtrack to the west end of Nordhoff Ridge and headed out with almost 3700.

The glide started out ok on a nice buoyant seam, but down lower there was more headwind in vertically neutral air, so we were evaluating possibilities for plan B.  Down to the last few hundred feet the headwind relaxed some and we had the field across the street from the school made.  Our preference was to land on the stadium lawn (I like the grass) so we continued and were able to squeak through the low spot in the trees for a short final and a good landing in sweet conditions at 20 past 3.

Neal showed up 15 minutes later at 3:36, only an hour and 6 minutes before official sunset, but the sun actually goes down behind the low coastal mountains earlier.  Peter chased and brought hot sandwiches.  We snapped a selfie (camera sitting on the fence triggered by the timer) before squeezing 6 bodies plus gear in Peter's 5 passenger vehicle that was already loaded to the top with his "stuff".  Arrived back in Carpinteria a little after sunset, but still had daylight.  They were happy to boot me out to match the bodies to seats.

Max Hogan was in Ojai further east, but Edward was bringing his truck from Santa Barbara.  Marty, Matt, and Jonathan (HG) had landed in Fillmore.  We figured Matt and Marty would take the bus back and Tavis, who was with us, was going to collect Jonathan's vehicle at East Beach and pick him and his hang glider up in Fillmore.  Turns out that Matt and Marty waited for Tavis, so Jonathan gave them a ride to Ventura, and Marty boosted Matt back to Santa Barbara.

Overall it was a fun day but I was a little stressed hearing everyone on course to big flights as we were making a bee line to Parma.  It all worked out and I had a memorable flight with Stephan.

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