C.J.'s birthday fell on a weekend other than Memorial Day so there probably would not be any great crowds on the roads. (And, as it turned out, even Chelan was underpopulated for a late spring weekend. The only place we found wall-to-wall people was in Leavenworth.)
Click on C.J.'s scrapbook image to see it full-screen.
After working late installing the wiring for a brake controller in the Outback, I was a bit slow to get going Saturday morning. But we got loaded up and off by 0900; that put us in Chelan too late to consider paragliding - the middle-of-the-day thermals were not what we were looking for. After a brief cruise-through to check out Beebe Bridge campground (lots of empty sites at noon), we drove up the new McNeil Canyon Road and on through Mansfield, Sims, and Leahy to the Barker Canyon Dept. of Fish and Wildlife boat launch. A number of motorhomes were camped in the parking lot but there was plenty of room to unload and gear up. The wind was light as we headed straight across to the peninsula and continued light until we were eating lunch on a large island. Since we really wanted to reach the narrow passages and islands of the far east side of the peninsula, we continued downwind for another two miles. The steep-walled, flooded canyon kept us out of the wind for a while as we rounded the islands but soon enough we were back in the wind and paddling pretty much straight into it. Good thing we had stopped to put on our spray skirts because we took a fair amount of splash over the bow as we paddled on, while making about half of our downwind speed - and working twice as hard for it. Our route took us between the group of islands and Steamboat Rock and straight back to Barker Canyon. A couple of sunburned fishermen helped lift the kayak back onto the Trooper and we drove back to Beebe (still lots of room) where we had convinced ourselves to camp in comfort (even though we'd have to pay the high-season rates). However, a call to Darren had us motoring on to Tom and Lori's where we partied a while with the hang glider pilots who had called off the task for the day due to high winds. Later, with detailed directions, we found our way to Tina and Larry's property up Cagle Gulch Road and camped there for the night in the cooler air 2000 ft above Lake Chelan.
The next morning we were baked out of our tent by the sun and thus were ready to leave early. A check with the pilots at Tom and Lori's produced a weather report for strong winds again later in the day. We got a ride up the hill in the back of Jimmy Culler's truck and I launched from Ants around 1115. Lift was abundant but very sharp-edged and my glider kept getting small collapses - it was not pleasant flying. I reached 1000 ft over launch above the towers and decided that was enough. Lone Pine was one possibility for an LZ, so were "the fingers", but as I looked carefully at the Lakeside Park beach,I could see very few sunbathers so I landed with plenty of room to spare there. After packing up in the shade (an advantage that the fingers would not have had) I carried my pack (ugh) up to Tom and Lori's, grabbed the truck and headed off to get C.J. at the soccer field. On the way back we stopped in Leavenworth for some "street sausage" (good) and Bavarian soda (bad). The water was high and fast in Tumwater Canyon and there were a lot of water falls tumbling from high above the road. We stopped for a break at the Iron Goat trailhead and info center before continuing on to Marysville and Everett to look at the Chalet LTW pop-up trailer and the Aliner Classic (the Sport was not in stock yet). One more stop for refreshment at DQ and we were home by 1830.
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