Independence Day Flight Report 2020, Walt's Point CA.

A fun extended weekend trip to the Owens over the 4th of July.  Not a  great forecast for epic conditions, just a let's go and see what we get, and have a good time trip.

Willy Dydo and his buddy Jay to drive and Darren, and another pilot from the Reno area and myself made up the crew.  I drove down Thursday the second and we all flew Friday.  Not very good conditions at all.  I was the only one to make it to Lone Pine airport, which is only 8.75 miles from launch.

Willy was flying his Alpha training glider and Darren was on a Falcon, Willy landed at the Pheasant Club LZ off Horseshoe Meadows Rd and Darren at the bailout at the foot of the Sierras a couple miles short of it. The other pilot who's name I forgot also landed in that area.

I hadn't gotten a lot of sleep the night before, after driving down that day so wasn't really looking to go long anyway.

The next day was the 4th of July and after a good nights rest we gave it another try.  Willy, Darren and myself with Jay driving. The other pilot left to go home after his flight the day before.

Willy decided to fly his T2C 136 and try for a out and return flight. It didn't look like a record day to me so I wasn't expecting anything great, but being in the Owens Valley you never know what the day could turn into as conditions can change quickly.  Here's the pics and story of how it unfolded.

Walts Point launch. A few other pilots from the Reno area showed up also.

Darrens Falcon. Mark from Reno's T2C. A Moyes RX Pro, behind my Laminar. Willys T2C, and Spike's rig and T2C with the bag still on it.  Mark's launch got out of shape quickly I guess. I had already left the area. He stalled his right wing, clipped a bush, turned 170 degrees and pancaked below launch a hundred ft. or so. He was unhurt but the wing took some damage. I heard later he had the nose high and didn't point it down the slope and get it moving before leaving the ground. An expensive lesson.

Willy tagged Bartlett for his out and return while I was still trying to get some altitude to continue down the range. He continued up the range toward Whitney Portal low while I patiently waited for the day to turn on.  It was slow in starting but I was able to maintain around 10k as Willy got ahead of me about ten miles.  My glider is small by design, 13.2 meters/sq. or 142.5 sq/ft. It's not a 50 to a 100ft up per minute climb beast. I got it specifically to break the Walts Point, open distance site record, in big conditions which the Owens Valley is famous for.  

Once conditions hit 300fpm it climbs great, when they are 1000/fpm it truly shines because with my weight on it, I hook in around 230lbs. it's easily controllable.  I can thermal it with full VG but usually let it off to half or a quarter for most thermals. If they are ratty and turbulent I let it off all the way and rock up and let it do it's thing with minimal inputs, take a drink of water and listen to the vario sing its song as I rocket skyward.  

When it comes time to glide between thermals I pull full VG (variable geometry) for those who don't know the term.  Our gliders have a central cross bar inside the sail, which connects to both leading edges of the wing.  Pulling the cord straightens this cross bar where it is hinged in the middle and pushes the leading edges forward, tightening the sail.  The gliders performance is greatly improved by doing this, but it's handling suffers some what.  We launch and land with just a bit of VG on for the best roll control and a good flare break when we come in to land.  Most beginning gliders have no VG to mess with. But once you know the basics and want to put down some miles you move up to one that does.  You can see this cord in a lot of Youtube videos. My channel is here https://www.youtube.com/user/highhuber  if your interested. Some of the videos have the music silenced out due to property claims, but most of them still have it.

Willy made it across the valley to Black Mt. eventually after reporting himself real low near the volcanic cinder cone in the middle.  I was on course maybe 15 miles behind him at this point not getting real high, barely breaking 12k, or 12,000ft. which is low for crossing the valley.  The winds were holding SE fairly lite and there were no clouds marking lift anywhere. Just a stable mediocre day in the Owens Valley for putting down some miles.  I decided to just hang on the Sierras and continue up toward Crowley Lake, which you can see here in the pic. Hwy 395 follows along their base all the way to Reno and beyond. Willy had landed at this point in Hammil at the base of White Mt for 80 miles beside hwy 6 north of Bishop. 

 I'm at about 80 miles out here and thought I would just keep heading for Mammoth Mt. which you can see in the far left of the pic, just before the snowy mts. in the background which are the Ritter Range. Mono Lake can be seen in the right distance above Lake Crowley on the other side of the Glass Mt.s  Yosemite Valley is behind the Ritter Range to the West. I had never flown this direction before from Walts, and this was why I did so. Just to try a new route seeing as how the site records were safe from our endeavors on this day, due to the poor conditions.

Darren landed his Falcon in the bailout again and Jay reported he was taking him back to launch for a reflight. That had been a few hours ago and we had not heard from him. Willy and I had talked a few times, he knew where I was headed and I knew where he had landed. We are both using InReach sattelite  transmitters so Jay can easily keep track of us with his smart phone, as long as he has cell phone coverage.  No worries of being found at the end of a long day.

This is looking back at Bishop CA. from the same spot. Black Mt. in the left middle distance behind Bishop.  I'm getting high here, topping out at 16.3k and encountering the SW winds blowing over the Sierras.

Looking south into the beautiful Sierra back country.  Same location as I top up. Red Mt. below, Hilton Lakes center right. Rock Creek Rd. and lake left. 

Looking out across Crowley Lake to the Glass Mts.  I have flown them and flown over them before so with the SW winds blowing me off the Sierras, I decide to fly over there, get high and reconnect with Hwy 6 near Benton.  As I am crossing the ground winds turn on and big wind lines form on Crowley Lake from the west. I'm flying above most of it but know when I hit the Glass Mts. I will probably get some good ridge lift to work along with thermals to top out over them with enough altitude to glide over to the north end of the Owens Vly near Benton. The pic is a little tilted but you can figure it out.

I did just that. Got to around 13k on the Glass Mts. bailed over the back and landed near here after not finding much else. That's Montgomery Peak in the background. North end of Benton in the right distance. A fun day flying for almost 6hrs. and covering 96 straight line miles. The guys got to me as I packed up. We had dinner in Bishop at Whiskey Creek restaurant and caught the fire works in Independence Ca. on the way back to camp.  No other way I can think of social distancing even comes close. Find your passion and follow it, that's my advice.

My InReach track Log. Check it here on any given day and follow along on my flights. It is uploaded almost real time but is about ten minutes behind. click on the blue dots and hit (more) for altitude and speed and location.  https://share.garmin.com/highhuber   Use the Map Filters on the left to view specific dates, or the last seven flights or whatever. Hit View All Tracks to see them all.