I'll drive down the mountain if I can catch a ride to the LZ.

I have other commitments on Sat., but would like going to sonoita valley training hills on Sun.

Hey Raph,
Saturday looks like crap and I can get a bunch of stuff done around the house. I will head to Sonoita on Sunday around 8am and take my axe and handsaw to do a little clean up. See you out there.

I am interested. my place 0730?

I will be going to the training hills on Sunday, probably leave around 7?


Eric

I'd love to join you, but I'm headed to Europe on business, returning Thursday and hoping for flyable weather next weekend.

Sunday: Could be Charlie's Hill in am & Antelope's after 12 noon.
Anyway I'll leave town around 8am.
Come on out & enjoy the beautiful Sonoita Valley.

Eric Smith, Mike, Jake, Eric Tucker, Raquel and I wound up at the Miller north launch at around 10 on Saturday morning. It was a gorgeous day, blowing north northeast around 5-8 and the ravens were already soaring when we got there. We were concerned, though, about the possibility of an early switch to northwest, and indeed by the time we got set up there were cross-left cycles mixed with the straight-in cycles on the north launch. So we started taking off early, probably 10:45 or 11 AM.

So Eric Smith was off first, and didn't seem to find a lot of lift. He eventually headed down the ridge toward the LZ and hooked a thermal over the high ground, getting back up. That was enough to coax off Eric Tucker, who got drilled pretty bad by heading into Miller Canyon, not finding anything as he went. He also flew toward the LZ. Mike was off next, and I followed soon after, all of us launched well before noon.

Eric had the flight of the day, with about an hour, but I don't think he ever got above launch altitude. Tucker, Mike and I all had flights in the 15-30 minute range, none above launch.

So it was a pretty day, and I suspect later on had lots of soaring potential, we just got too anxious and took off too soon. But everyone had good launches, nice flights and no aluminum was sacrificed to landings in the switchy, light springtime LZ conditions. So a success in almost every way.

BTW, it may seem early in the season but the dust devils are out already, we had one drive over Mike and me as we broke down our gliders. If they had been an-attended we would have been looking at repairs. So caution is warranted both on landing approaches and in quick breakdowns after flying.

As always, we can't do this without the support of our wire crews and drivers. A huge thanks to Jake and Racquel for their help and support.

John