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| Chelan Butte, the lake, the city, and the river |
This was my first time in Chelan. It’s a beautiful site to fly and the people are very friendly. Bing Cherries were in season while I was there. YUM…
Flying in comps is always fun except
for some of the waiting that goes with them. Plus you get a T-shirt. I think it’s safer flying as well. Lots of launch and weather monitoring you don’t
get free-flying. Some of the things I
learned about the site and flying in comps in general are salted through this
blog entry and summarized at the end.
Hope you enjoy reading it.
Arrival:
July 6, 2012
My Jury duty with the Washington County circuit court lasted
all of 1.5 hours. I showed up at 8:00
and by 9:30 the cases scheduled for trial were settled or for some other reason
no jurors were needed. I’ve fulfilled my
duty for the next two years. Too bad
this kept me from attending Lakeview but flying Chelan in a comp with the best
pilots in the U.S should be a lot of fun and a learning experience.I headed home, hooked up the trailer and was on my way by 11:00 am. It’s a five hour plus drive from Portland with no stops.
Most people who attend the comp and are camping stay at Beebe Bridge campground just outside Chelan. It is a beautiful place on the river with nice green grass and asphalt leveled pad for your trailer or RV. They don’t take reservations. It’s first come first served. Unfortunately when I arrived the campground was full as was the other one on the lake in Chelan. I called Denise Stroop (wife of meet director) and she found a place for me out by the airport.
I had to drive down a dirt road in between some Bing cherry
trees and down to a valley by a Christmas tree farm. It was fairly deserted but there were signs
of some other campers there. They had
their tents back in the trees.
I set the camper up for a short stay and drove into town to
get some dinner. A senior’s burger
special at the Apple Cup Café. Not
bad.
 |
| Camping at the Christmas tree farm |
Practice
Day
I had a nice quiet and cool night down in the valley until
just before dawn when the cannons started going off in the orchard to keep the
birds away. I went into town for
breakfast and then made a swing though Beebe Park Campground. Mike Steed was there and he recommended I
bring the trailer back because he knew some of the hang pilots who had been around
for the XC were leaving. I didn’t know
Mike was going to be there. Otherwise we
probably could have shared a campsite and maybe even a ride. Maybe next time…
I quickly returned to the airport camping site, picked up
the trailer and headed back to the campground. After two orbits I found a
freshly vacated spot. I quickly
registered and did the minimum to get things set up then I immediately headed
over to Chelan Falls Park on the other side of the river with my gear hoping to
get a ride up the hill. The soccer field
at the park is the main LZ and meeting point for going up the hill.
I got a ride up with some hang pilots and met Joe Stermitz
up on launch. Mike Steed and the other
pilots had already launched. Joe gave me a quick site orientation and armed
with his information and insight I got my gear ready and launched around 2:00
pm. |
| High over launch |
There was a mandatory pilots meeting in the evening with the usual selection of a task committee , safety committee, protest committee and download of coordinates. This meeting was much more laid back than the Rat Race Comp. Part of that was Doug Stroop’s (meet director) style and the rest was that the pilots attending were not novice pilots. The best pilots in the U.S were here to compete and have fun. I was here to have fun and get rides up to launch and retrieves. My goal was just to stay out of last place.
I had dinner and headed back to the campground. It was hot and it took a while for things to
cool down from the peak heat of the day which was up over 100 degrees. Finally by 10:00 pm it was cool enough to
sleep.
Day 1 Task
1
It was a north day.
My flight from the previous day had given me a sense of confidence. This place should be easy to get up and I
shouldn’t have any problems getting across the river. Task was to head north. It ended up not mattering for me. I launched and slowly sank with only a few
bubbles of lift and ended up landing on a dirt road on a plateau called Coyote
Flats just above the orchards along the river.
The road looked fairly level and it seemed like the best
option. I turned on the SPOT, and texted
HQ my coordinates and then started packing up.
By the time I was ready to put my harness in the backpack the SPOT had
still not locked on so I put it on the ground while I continued to pack
up. Retrieve called and I gave them my
intentions to hike north along the road.
The driver was having some trouble with her GPS and I eventually gave
her the coordinates of where I was hiking to about 2.5 kilometers north. I started down the road and about 500 meters
later realized I had left my SPOT where I landed. I dropped the backpack and headed back for
it. My 2.5k hike just became 3.5k. Temperature was around 103 degrees F. It was a very hot hike and I’m glad I had
plenty of water with me.
 |
| Soccer field LZ and Coyote Flats |
I hiked through two gates on the way to the main “dirt” road
where retrieve was waiting for me. The
last one was locked so there was no way retrieve could have got to me where I
landed. The retrieve driver had stopped using here Garmin and switched to using
Google Maps on her IPad. It actually
worked much better once she figured it out.
IPhones with Google maps can probably do the same thing.
After a lot more water I finally started to cool down. All I can say is that I am I’m glad I have
been going to the gym every morning.
It stayed hot very late into the evening. It only cooled off when the light show and
thunderstorms rolled in. There was a
massive lighting strike on the Butte that set off a brush fire in the flats
near where I was hiking earlier in the day.
I stood under the canopy outside the trailer across the river at Beebe
Bridge Park watched the show. Rain and
the red glow of burning grass and sage was quite a site.
The rain cooled things down and by midnight I managed to get
to sleep.
 |
| Fire on the ridge viewed from across the river at Beebe Bridge campground |
Day 2 Task
cancelled
The fire on the ridge set off by the thunderstorms the night
before appeared out when I got up at around 6:00 am. Some hot spots flared up and around
7:00am. The hill was on fire again and
a chopper was soon busy dumping water as fire crews worked the perimeter. Not much to burn up there but dry grass and
sage so it burns quickly but is also fairly easy to put out quickly. There was a TFR (temporary flight
restriction) put up and the Forest Service closed the road. The day was called at 9:30 and we were free
to do whatever we wanted in the 105 degree F. heat. |
| Some of the pilots relaxing at campground |
I spent the afternoon under the canopy in the campground drinking
lemonade and trying to stay as cool as possible. Mike Steed called me later in the day and we
headed into town for a dinner at the Thai restaurant. I went for medium on the spices. I can’t imagine what hot would be like. Medium was all I could take. After dinner I watched a movie on the PC and
called it a night. Very hot till around
11.
Day 3 task
2
Task for the day was to fly to Sims Corner and back. Top of
lift was forecast to be around 11,000 feet.
I was determined to wait and be one of the last to
launch. I wanted to see where people
were getting up. That part of my plan worked perfectly. Base winds were from the southwest at launch
and steady enough that all the pilots got off very quickly. No long waits in line like Day 1.
I found a nice
thermal right in front of launch and was soon thermaling with the gaggle. At about 6500 feet I lost the lift and the
gaggle started across 500 to 1000 feet above me. I bounced around between 5400 and 5800 feet for the next 30 minutes looking for the
elevator to get to 7000 as I slowly
drifted north. I wasn’t having any luck
so I decided to try heading back upwind to launch and restart. That was a bad decision. Heading upwind I hit sink out away from the
ridge and arrived well below launch and had to turn towards the bailout and
start looking for lift. I didn’t want to
land on Coyote Flats again.
There was just enough lift to make the “red roof”
bailout. I landed in the nice soft green
grass lawn and the owners were nice enough to bring me an ice water and drive
me to the soccer field LZ.
I drove into town and picked up a few things and then
returned to the soccer field which was goal for the day to watch the leaders
come in. Icepeak 6 after Icepeak 6.
 |
| Red roof house |
I had dinner with Mike and Brett Z. a pilot from Alaska and
then called it a day.
Day 4 Task
3
A high pressure day with south winds. Task was over 100 K north.
I watched closely as the leaders launched to see where they
were climbing out and waited as long as I could before launching. I launched from the “green monster” and made
S turns back and forth slowly descending
800 feet below launch on the south
facing ridge. Finally I caught a thermal
and tracked it up to 7000 feet. I was
all by myself at this point since I was the second to last pilot to
launch.
I made it across the river to with enough altitude to catch
another thermal along the rim and headed northeast along the ridge. There were a couple of gliders scratching
below me as I circled up. Leaving that
thermal I floated with the wind for a while but decided I had better go back
and get that thermal since I wasn’t finding anything. That was a mistake. Heading back upwind where the Flymaster dot
said I should go got me nothing but sink and I was soon down at the edge of the
rim scratching with another glider. I
didn’t find anything. I scratched further down into McNeil Canyon
and ended up landing.  |
| On final |
The GoPro was working and taking pictures every two seconds. I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening at HQ going through the 1700-plus pictures I had taken.
While I was doing that I had a chance to see how the
retrieve operation worked from their perspective. The retrieve crew was in full
gear. Zak was busy monitoring the spot
locations and text messages were being forwarded to the nearest driver as the
retrieve drivers made their rounds. They
had a big whiteboard with all the pilots listed and columns for different
status. Slowly, but surely, the checked
all the names off.
Only 55 minutes of flying but my first trip across the
river. The main lesson I “re-learned”
today is that it is not a good idea to chase thermals upwind. If I had headed downwind further into the
flats I would have had a chance to get out of the start cylinder and make more
than minimum distance points. Still I
was happy with the day. I finally
made it across the river and on to the flats.
 |
| Retrieve Central at HQ |
Day 5 Task
4
Forecast on XC skies was a duplicate of the previous
day. I decided I would launch a little
earlier to try and take advantage of the gaggle’s collective brain but wasn’t
fast enough getting ready and launched late again.
I found a thermal right off launch and climbed up to 11,700
very quickly with three other gliders.
The gaggle was still ahead of me but I was at a point where I could see
them pulling away from me anyway. I
crossed the river losing some altitude but found another thermal over Farnham
Canyon and got back up to 11,000 plus.
Then another thermal over the power lines but high clouds had moved in
and the lift was a lot slower. A lot of
200-400 fpm stuff.
I looked at my course line and where the gliders were ahead
of me. I was not sure why they were so
far right of course. I decided not to
follow them and I headed more directly toward Mansfield, the first turn point
on what my Flymaster told me was the route optimized course. Later talking to one of the pilots I
understood why they took the course they did.
It’s always smart to fly upwind of the course line so that when you
catch the thermal you don’t drift downwind of it and then have to struggle to
get back.
 |
| Heading for Mansfield |
I was happy. It took
over 2.5 hours but I made the first turn point on the course and I had my first
real experience over the flats. This
flight also got me out of last place.
Today I waited 45 minutes or so for the retrieve driver to
get to me and then since I was the first person in the van ended up in the van
for three hours until it was full so we could head back to the soccer field. It was a good experience in seeing what the
retrieve drivers go through. Coordination
with HQ sometimes is lacking and they had to sometimes re-task their pickups
among themselves to improve efficiency.
Anyway there was beer in the van and I kept busy helping the driver who
had to manage driving the van, talking on the radio, text messaging on his cell
phone, and programming the GPS.
I was at the comp for the rides up to launch and the
retrieves. Mary Beth has really spoiled
me. She is generally chasing me and
being right at my landing spot or picking me up within a half hour of landing
and taking me directly back to civilization.
I intended to launch early and did get off on course a
little earlier than previous tasks. I
was up circling with the gaggle before the race started but not high enough to
think about crossing. The gaggle started
across while I searched for more altitude.
I would find it and then get blown back southwest of launch and lose it
coming back to the river. Finally at
around 8700 I headed across aiming at the two pyramid houses with a big black
rock face behind them on the south side of Farnham Canyon.
When I arrived I had enough altitude to do a little
searching along the rim and found a thermal that gave me enough altitude to
press on to the power lines. At this
point I had caught up with a number of gliders.
Some thermaling ahead and above me and others scratching down low.
The wind was southwest and I was staying upwind of the
course line hoping to get at least past Mansfield. I was finding either light lift or massive
turbulent thermals coming up. At about
10 k on course I found a big thermal and a couple of other gliders were soon
with me. I climbed up a couple thousand
feet but was getting rocked around so much that I decided to leave it and hope
to find something gentler on course.
The lesson here is that “hoping” is not a good strategy
although flying safely within your limits is.
My EN B class glider is rock solid and when I start seeing collapses
with it I get nervous. The serious comp
pilots agreed it was rough air. One
pilot had to throw his reserve out in the flats and broke an ankle when he
landed on the road.
Anyway I didn’t find anything strong enough to turn in and
was down on the deck about 2K later. So
much for “hoping”.
I sat on a dirt road between a plowed field and a wheat
field for about an hour and a half waiting for a retrieve. Once picked up the retrieve driver picked up
a couple of other pilots before we headed back to town. I was back at the soccer field about two and
a half hours after I landing. Not
bad. Some pilots waited a lot longer.  |
| This goes on for miles and miles |
I have no pictures from my GoPro for the day. Apparently the connection to the charger failed during the night. I was no red light on indicating it was still charging but the battery was dead when I tried turning it on at launch. Too bad. I would have had some great pictures thermaling with the gaggle at the start of the race.
Weather for tomorrow doesn’t look that great with 50% chance
of thunderstorms. Maybe they will start
the party early.
Day 7 Task
6?
The weather was dismal enough that we waited in the parking
lot till 10:30 to make a decision on whether to go up the hill or cancel the
day.
Things looked better so we all headed up to launch. Less cloud cover but still looking like
things might go bad. A short task was
called and we were all warned to keep monitoring the radio since there was a
strong possibility things would overdevelop and the task might have to be
stopped.
I had intended to launch earlier in the group but I was slow
getting my gear ready and once again was one of the last to launch. Everyone or nearly everyone was up there thermaling
high above launch.
There was nice
thermal right out in front of launch and I started climbing out while looking
at the dark cloud above me that seemed to be sucking me up. There were still gliders above me with plenty
of cloud clearance but at 6500 feet and with most of the group heading for the
start cylinder which was some distance out in the flats across the river I
decided to head across at 6500. At the
time I questioned my decision but went ahead anyway. I just can’t seem to learn
that I need to get every foot of altitude I can out of a thermal before leaving
it.
I seemed to have neutral buoyancy from the cloud above me or
be in slight lift for the first part of my trip across the river. I took a course line across the North end of
Farnham Canyon at the top of the ridge where there were some small bowls that I
thought might be triggering thermals.
I arrived fairly low and had just one chance to find
something. There was no lift there. Now I was wishing I had left with that extra
500 to 1000 feet of altitude. I would
have had a lot more options. I had to either go low to the flats above the
canyon or continue along the ridge and over into McNeil Canyon. I chose to surf the canyon rim along McNeil
Canyon hoping to find something that would get me up high enough to go out on
the flats. I made some distance with
this move but now altitude gain.
Eventually I was down below the rim and just maintaining in ridge lift
hoping that sunshine would warm things up an I could fly out.
I was joined by a hawk.
I think he was about to chase me away but then I started going lower on
the hill and I think he must have just laughed to himself and flown on as I
sunk out. Flying out to the landing area
I had picked I hit a nice thermal but it was a little small and I was close to
some power lines so I couldn’t risk more than one turn in it before giving up
and landing. Now I’m wondering if that
area which was a bit sheltered from the wind had been a better place to go when
I was a few hundred feet higher.
Something to try next time…
 |
| The hawk just flys away laughing |
I hit the button on my spot and texted in my information
using my cell phone. Retrieve arrived
before I managed go get packed up. As I
was packing up the call came through that the task was stopped due to
overdevelopment on the course. It was a
good call. Everyone got down safely but
the task was long enough to score and award points.
I took my GPS to HQ to get scored and then grabbed a quick
shower and prepped the camping trailer for an early departure Sunday before
heading to the barbecue dinner and awards ceremony back at HQ.
Results are at this link.
http://www.chelanxcopen.com/ Josh Cohn took first. He’s so consistent in his flying. Mike Steed
came in 11th. A nice showing
since he was flying his new Icepeak 6 for the first time at this comp. . I
managed to stay out of last place-- but just barely.
After the dinner and awards I had a chance to relax and
spend a little time talking with the other pilots. Among other things Brian Webb from Australia
and I talked through my problem of knowing that I should not leave lift to go
on course too early and still do it and Kari
Castle told me a little about flying in the Owens valley in the middle of Sept
versus late October. I was talking to
Matt Church from Scotland and finally connected the dots. I had flown with him in Wilderness, South
Africa back in 2007.
 |
| Serial winners Cohn, Greece, and McRae |
I left the party early and was in bed by 10:00 pm for an
early morning departure on Sunday.
"Learnings" and "re-learnings" for the week.
·
A good understanding of the site and experience
flying there can go a long way in improving your results
·
Chelan can be “big air” but its manageable and a
beautiful, fun site to fly.
·
1200 fpm lift is OK as long as it’s smooth.
·
Don’t cross the river below 7000 feet even on a
high pressure day. Above 10,000 feet or higher is ideal other times
·
If you have a little altitude over the plateau called
Coyote Flats you can most likely glide over the orchards to the red house
bailout.
·
Finding lift on the canyon rim is a last
resort. Better to head for the flats and
power lines
·
Better to leave the rim with enough altitude to
make a last try at catching a thermal in the canyon than slowly sinking
down the canyon wall.
·
Launch as early as you can once you are
convinced you can stay up. Have your
gear ready so you can jump in line
quickly when you need to instead of waiting and then being stuck at the end of the
line.
·
Never leave a thermal when there is more
altitude to be had unless it is the last one between you and goal.
·
Stay on the upwind side of the course line when
navigating to a turn point.
·
Going back upwind searching for thermals is not
a good idea. Much better to do that
downwind if possible. You lose less
altitude.
Dan
Link to more pictures here
Dan
Link to more pictures here
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