Lakeview Paragliding Nationals June 24-30, 2007

June 24 – We got up early enough to drive Irina to Cantrall-Buckley campground to meet Arun who is going to give her a ride back to Issaquah. Andrei and Chris had already left for Lakeview right after the awards ceremony yesterday. After dropping Irina off, we returned to the yurt, packed up, cleaned up and stopped to thank Terri and Geoff. We gave them two gift cards for the three-diamond Porters restaurant. C.J. is going to make a t-shirt lap quilt for Barbara Summerhawk, owner of the yurt. Instead of taking the more direct SR 140, we took SR 66 from Ashland and wound slowly through the Siskiyous to Klamath and then on to Lakeview. It took at least four hours but was nicely scenic. The wind was strong all the way to Lakeview and we arrived just as the task was being canceled with only a very few people flying. We set up the tent at the fairgrounds and went into town to see Caro at the Chamber of Commerce who gave us a tour of the new bank in the old saloon/bordello across the street, and her latest project, a mural of hang gliders and paragliders on another bank building right on the main street. After a strawberry shake at Jerry’s we went back to HQ at the fairgrounds and scrounged some additional sleeping bags/blankets in anticipation of the frost warning that has been issued for tonight. Later we went to El Aguila Real for dinner with Chris, Andrei, Sam Crocker and Dave Wheeler. It seemed like it was the place to be for pilots and locals as well.

June 25 – There was frost on our chairs when I got up this morning but we were comfortable in the tent with our down comforter, blanket and fleece over flannel sheets. The first task of the Nats is to fly from Blackcap north along the ridge west of the Warner Range to Ennis Butte just short of Paisley, then to Sims Ranch and back to goal at Valley Falls. We drove up to launch with Alicia and somehow C.J. inspired me to fly even though I had not really been considering it. Conditions were light but I got a “wind tech” wristband from Karl Decker (predatorwings.com) and got as ready as I could without any fleece, camelback or warm gloves. After a few other wind techs had launched (including Alicia, Lori, and a guy flying a Gradient Bolid) I took off at 1227 and sank right down the face towards the LZ finally catching a thermal when it seemed too late. C.J., who had launched shortly after me, was below and did not get the lift I was in. I spiraled up over launch and to 7000 ft, moved north, sunk and climbed again to 8000. My plan was to fly to goal at Valley Falls without going to Ennis first. That was a pretty ambitious goal since my longest XC flight at Lakeview was only 3-4 miles. Still, I was moving north at around 28 kph and had reached 9000 ft at least once and the turbulence was pretty endurable. I crossed Hwy 140 and was now over lower relief topography. By the time I reached 13 km from BLA146 I was low and I decided to cross Hwy 395 where it turns east and goes down a canyon to the big valley below Palisades launch. Hitting no lift, I flew down the slope into the valley, crossed 395 again and landed into the wind to the north. (Lori landed a short distance north but I did not spot her). After packing up (outside of the fence of the field in the shade of the only tree around) I walked up the dirt road to the highway, refused a ride to goal from a couple of drivers and spent some time talking to a local couple who had come out to watch the gaggles flying north along the ridge leading to Ennis. After I landed I had no more contact with C.J. either on simplex or the 147.00+ repeater on Black Cap so I accepted a ride back to town with the Vietnam vet and his wife.

Some pilots were already back when I got to the fairgrounds and HQ but most would trickle in during the day and into the night and others decided to head home complaining about rough air (Dave Wheeler was already gone). We waited until Chris showed up and went to dinner at Jerry’s with Kyndel who had come closest to making goal; Sam Crocker and another pilot showed up, then Stefan and Meredith so we had a full table plus more pulled together. Meredith (with David Salmon) was among those who had a two hour hike out of wherever she landed. Andrei was even later – not back by the time we went to bed. Later he said it was like hiking through a Discovery Channel show.

June 26 – After cooking another batch of oatmeal in the frying pan we went to the 0830 meeting with Mark Webber to hear what he had to say about using ham radios (and grab a breakfast smoothie). Afterwards I helped a couple of pilots program in the repeater frequencies and tone. After saying goodbye to everyone, and thanking Gail, we broke camp and were out of Lakeview by 1000. The trip to North Bend took almost 12 hours because we stopped to shop at the outlet mall in Bend and bought gas (296.9/gal) in Yakima and had a Costco food court dinner. [We learned later that a task all the way to Frenchglen (145.3 km) had been flown that day.]