Sunrise Trouble

Sunrise wanted

There are certain things you want to see and do for no particular reason. For me, one of those things was to fly into sunrise at Wellfleet, Cape Cod. The idea had a good romantic feel to it, plus, an excellent photo op. The downside - it's 2 hours 40 minutes drive and one hour setup time. With sunrise at 6:40 AM, I had to leave my house at 3 AM....

I posted on a local email list that I was going to do this crazy thing. Ilya decided to keep me a company. Such an early trip wasn't his idea of fun, but I guess, my enthusiasm was contagious. Having another pilot to help me launch was very much appreciated. Thank you, my sky brother!

But not everything was going smoothly. I got sick just a couple of days earlier. No matter. I was going. Flying at the Cape doesn't happen often, and forecast was too good to skip it. I knew I could focus and just do it. It would be much easier if I wasn't sick, but hey, gotta suffer a bit to have some fun. Right? Maybe? No?

Getting ready

Natalia and I left our house as planned - 3AM. It helped that we went to bed early, but I don't think we got more than 4 hours of sleep anyway.

Drive down the Cape was pretty easy. Empty roads and all. I didn't feel too bad. We arrived to White Crest Beach a bit later than planned, around 5:45 AM. Along the route there was a road construction going on, and we had to take a detour. Anyway, still plenty of time to set up... Except, setting up in the dark was not all that easy. It took me way longer than I expected.

By the time, I was ready to take off, sun started to light up clouds on the horizon. I was late by a few minutes, but the view was still pretty nice. I didn't really have time to enjoy it yet - take off is a serious business.

Ilya was helping me on launch, holding nose wires down. Natalia, reluctantly, helped us to cross the road (is that a set up for a joke?), and carry the glider toward the launch line.  I thinks, it was the last time she would do it for me. It was more stressful for her (she is not a pilot) than it was for us.

Crossing the road

On launch, winds were around 20mph. It wasn't too bad, but something wasn't working. I couldn't feel the glider. It slowly occurred to me that I had to talk to Ilya and tell him what I needed. I was amazed at the realization that since a pilot was helping me, I expected him to know what to do.  Ok, I gotta stop it, I am the pilot in command - communicate with my wire crew.

One of the problems was that Ilya was holding nose wires too tight/low. We don't fly at the ocean too often, and all our reactions are based on mountain sites, where a thermal can roll through at any moment and pick you up. It is different at the ocean - laminar airflow makes things easier.

I asked llya to let the glider slide up. Now I could feel it. I switched to the base bar - the glider still didn't feel the way I wanted it. I remembered, an incident last year where Jeff Curtis had a wing lifted at launch, and he barely recovered.

 I also remembered what Tom Lanning said after that day - point the glider perpendicular to dune, even if wind is crossing. Wind deflecting from the dune rises straight up, and you want to be straight into THAT flow.

Into Sunrise 

Wind was slightly crossing from north, and that's the way my glider was pointing - into the wind. I asked Ilya to turn until I felt we were in the right position. All felt good now, I yelled "Clear", Ilya let go and done some crazy ninja dive to get out of the way. Glider started to turn into the wind slightly, I got it under control and floated up above the dune.

Phew! All was well now. Most stressful part of Cape Cod flying was behind me. After being so focused, I could finally relax and enjoy the view.

Launching into sunrise

Trip to Nauset lighthouse

While waiting for Ilya to launch, I decided to do the easy trip to south lighthouse. Probably 40 minutes round trip. There are no big gaps to cross, and it's a good way to adjust to dune flying.

My trip there was indeed pretty easy and uneventful. The view was pretty nice with sun rising slowly above the ocean. I didn't set my camera the way I thought I would, but it still took some nice shots:

Sunrise flying

I was flying "downwind" so it didn't take too long. Nauset lighthouse, my first destination, - tagged!

Nauset lighthouse

Speedflying 

While flying back to launch, upwind, the progress was slow. I got bored crabbing, and started experimenting with flying faster. I pulled VG to half, and started diving at the dunes. Wind deflecting from the dunes was providing a nice cushion. Instead of diving into the ground I was accelerating along the dune!

Speed flying

When I was flying here in January I couldn't do the same. Flying in a straight line at full speed was still a challenge at that time. Now, after ~60hours on this glider, this was a breeze. I loved it! Higher VG settings also meant lower bar pressure and less effort required to fly faster.

Trouble at launch

Very soon I was back at launch. A few pilots pulled in since I left. I saw Ilya finally getting ready to launch. He had a full wire crew.

Ilya with his wire crew

I decided to wait for Ilya so we could fly together. I was hanging out a hundred yards south of launch,  doing figures 8s. Waiting. A sudden motion attracted my attention and, with a stomach sinking feeling, I saw Ilya's glider flying in a wrong direction toward utility polls. It happened so fast...

The glider hit a pole and stopped. Everyone was running toward it. A few long seconds later, a very pissed off pilot emerged from under the glider. The way he walked indicated no damage to the pilot. That was a relief. The last thing you want to see is someone getting hurt. Glider can be fixed... As much as the whole incident sucked, a major disaster was miraculously avoided.

I boated for a bit around the launch, contemplating if I should land. Seeing that Ilya was fine and going about his business assessing the damage and disassembling the glider, I decided to keep flying.

Crossing the Gap

In all my previous flights at the Cape I never crossed the big gap north of launch. Never flown to north lighthouse (Highland lighthouse). Today could be that day. I should go for it, or landout trying.

I remembered Jon Atwood's advice to open harness before attempting to cross and be ready to land. That was exactly what I've done. Also, with my newly obtained skills of speedflying, I dove in for speed while I had the altitude.

Accelerating toward the gap

Beginning of the gap - still flying fast

Middle of the gap - slowing down to stay on the top of air going up

End of the gap - task completed. Dunes start to rise again.

As I got the the lowest part of the dune I started slowing down, modulating my speed to keep me off the ground. Very quickly I was on the other side. That was fun!

Here is a video of that crossing:

A couple of miles farther north, there was another gap. It went as smoothly. I tagged northern lighthouse and went back, crossing the gaps again without an issue.

Speeding past North Truro AFS radar station

Speeding toward Highland lighthouse

Highland lighthouse tagged!

Other activities

When I got back to the launch site a few more pilots got into the air. I chased them for a bit, sometimes passing below tops of the dunes. Here is Lee's video showing my pass:

After another 30 minutes of playing, I got bored. I landed and broke down the glider. Then I helped other pilots to get into the air and to retrieve a couple of unlucky ones that didn't cross the gap.

Safe on the ground. 'Twas a good flight.

Here are a few more videos from that day:

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Flight time: 2h 16m
Flight stats: http://www.paraglidingforum.com/leonardo/flight/1519551

Leaf peeping anxiety

October is beautiful time of the year in Vermont. Many people visit the state to enjoy colorful views that nature preparing for winter has to offer. There is no better vantage point for leaf peeping than from the sky. And no better way to experience it than free flying in mountains.
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Saturday forecast was pretty good for that kind of flying. Not a good thermal day (rarity that late in the season), but ridge soaring was a possibility.

In the morning at Morningside

With all those beautiful thoughts I still found a way to be anxious about upcoming flying day. It's not like being anxious is my favorite thing, and, if necessary, I don't shy away from experiences that require a healthy dose of anxiety. By now, I've launched hang gliders hundreds of times, but every time is different. And if there is a new element at play - anxiety level is even higher.

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Leaf peeping flight was gearing up to be one of those new experiences. I felt I was ready to do some mountain flying on my Combat. My first foot launch, and my first mountain flight on that glider. No better place to do this than West Rutland, Vermont. It's a very forgiving site and is a go-to place for new H2s/P2s to experience their first mount flight.

Light days is when paragliders shine

I've launched at West Rutland quite a few times. I had great soaring flights here, and my longest flight was here as well. All that didn't stop me from being nervous like hell.

In the setup area

I managed to ignore most of that rattly feeling until it was time to hook-in. I paused and took a moment to breathe to calm my nerves. Then, standing on the edge of the ramp, I let a pre-launch routine to take over, pushing out the new, high performance aspect of this launch out of my focus. 

Check wind direction, wait for a good cycle, balance the wing, keep the nose down.... "Clear!". I made the first step, and accelerated down the ramp. The glider effortlessly floated away from the mountain.

I turned right, flying along the ridge, keeping my airspeed up. Most likely higher than I had to. I still had rather low hours on this glider, and I wasn't going to take any chances. "Don't get too close to the terrain. You are not in your Sport", I kept reminding myself. 

The day was very light. Not a high performance glider day. In fact, a few pilots on T2Cs that launched before me, couldn't stay up for long. Thus, I didn't expect much.

As I was flying down the ridge, I couldn't feel any strong lift to turn in. I was probably (and most likely) a bit tense, too. A few hundred yards later, I had a decision to make - turn around and try the ridge again, or go out and look elsewhere. I picked the latter. One step at a time. There will be another day. 

Just as expected, I didn't find anything away from the ridge. Made a couple of 360 degree turns here and there, but couldn't go up. It was time to box the LZ and land.

I gave myself plenty of room so I wouldn't go too long, and as I was making my final turn, I got dumped much faster than I thought I would. I didn't make a hard slipping turn, so maybe it was just sinking air. No matter. No time to ponder - pull-in and get ready to land.... except I was going short now. I didn't think I would ever go short in that glider, but it was happening. My flight path was through a dry corn field with dry corn stalks, probably 5 feet high. Not a nice place to land in. 

I slowed down for early ground effect, stayed prone, trying to extend my glide just a bit. I made it to the edge of the corn field, kicked the top of the stalks with my feet while I was transitioning, and flared hard as I was about to hit the ground. It worked. It was probably the best landing I got on this glider so far (except for going short part). The flare wasn't perfect as I dropped the bar, but I didn't whack. Good.

in the main LZ

So even though this flight was really short, I was happy with it. I am slowly gaining confidence with this high performance machine. Hopefully, in a season or two I'll get my Combat skills to the level I can be content with. Time will tell.

PS. About that leaf peeping thing... um, well, I did sort of enjoy the views from launch for a couple of hours, but my flight wasn't long enough to appreciate them from the air. Oh well, priorities, priorities.... I got what I came for. I left leaf peeping marveling to gentler souls.