Saturday at Hollister

The Hollister League gets ready to launch for their informal weekend contest:

Rod and I had a fun Mile High aeorbatic ride over the Diablos.  We encountered some heavy sink and stayed on tow until we knew we could make it back to the airport!  After release we found some great lift and were able to spin, loop, wing-over and turn tightly while still having enough altitude for Rod to understand the difference between his hours of "flight simulator" and an hour of the "real" thing!

A rain shower moved over the airport just as Serge, Anna and I launched for a Silver Hawk ride.  The tow out towards San Juan Bautista brought us into clear, cool air and Serge clicked away with his HD camera.  Anna had tried to clear off the condensation on the inside of the canopy with her hand as we had no "defroster".  My camera picked up the markings she made:

Anna liked the "roller-coaster" movement while Serge preferred the "ride of my wife" gently-turning-camera-platform flight.  She should come back for an "acro" ride!

After our landing and return to tie-down you can see the rain in the background.

Tuesday Hooky w/Kurt!

Kurt asked if I wanted to go and of course I said yes.  We had a nice 2.5 hr flight with some great Gilroy Convergence over Coyote Reservoir.

Saturday at Hollister

The Hollister League flew their informal contest with some pilots having 5 hour 500km flights!  Here are two getting ready to launch:

their flights:

ER

TG

You can see these are very similar flight paths flown in same-type gliders but by different pilots!  Six other gliders, two of which were two-place, also accomplished flights like these.

Meanwhile Joyce and I had a nice Mile High Scenic Ride around the Hollister area:

Steve and his father, Chuck, came later in the day for a Monterey Adventure Ride but the bay was covered in fog so we flew over the Diablos east of the airport looking at all the beautiful greenery from our wonderful rains:

Friday's flying

Matt and Lee prepare to launch in the BASA DG-1000 for a nice trip down south and back:

Here is their flight as recorded on GPS:

Meanwhile Hal, Bruce and I had a Monterey Bay Adventure Ride:

 our view:

John from "down under" goes up and over!

One of our tow-pilots brought a friend for a ride and we did a spin, loop and tight turns before he flew us back to Hollister.  Here is a picture of us with our glider and towplane in the background:

Special Birthday-Ride for Dalia's 35th?

George surprised Dalia for her birthday with a nice scenic ride to Monterey Bay and back to Hollister.

Waiting to take the runway with the towplane to follow for hook-up and launch:

After we released from the tow at 8250'MSL:

We had a nice smooth ride back until we encountered some convergence lift which allowed us to stay up for a little longer!

Saturday at Hollister

First flight was a test flight after the annual inspection and installation of a transponder so we can be seen by Air Traffic Control Radar.  I radioed the approach controller, received a squawk code, entered it and was told that we were in radar contact.  We will no longer be "stealthy."  After some stalls, spins, loops and tight turns together with any other stresses I can imagine a pilot putting on the aircraft, I landed for an examination prior to my first commercial ride of the day, a woman from DC who wanted some fresh air and an aerobatic ride.  I put the "chute" on Stephanie, briefed her re: CBA(canopy, belts, ass) then look, find, reach, pull etc.  Off we went to Monterey Bay and some acro followed by some nice easy sightseeing.  I think she really enjoyed the peacefulness and "bird's-eye-view".

The next ride was with Renai and her son Evan who was a little apprehensive but we worked it out in the air as you can see here:

Beauty on land and in the air:

Scott brought his wife Carla out for a birthday ride and we went towards the Bay.  The winds aloft were high and I kept us more upwind towards the north so we could be assured of landing back at Hollister and not Salinas or Monterey!

Now this is a happy couple.  Baby-sitter, glider ride and dinner.  Scott, you know the game.

But we know who is in the "pilot's" seat!

Friday' Birthday Ride

John brought Vanitha for a Mile High Mountain "birthday" ride and that's what we had!  We flew with two red-tailed hawks and an immature Golden Eagle while climbing 1500' in a thermal!  Not everyone gets to experience all that on any one ride.  They picked the right day!

Those are happy faces!

8 hour glider flight w/Matt!

Last Thursday Ramy and Matt were getting ready to launch on what they said was going to be a great day for soaring.  Ramy got himself out on the runway hooked up to the towplane and launched.  Matt had an empty back seat and asked if I wanted to go along.  I had a parachute on, O2 canula, some snacks, water and my "relief" system stowed and we launched at 11:30.  Ramy had already headed south to turn New Cayuma down by the Grapevine:
 http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0/gliding/flightinfo.html?flightId=1293818111
       We took the circular tour which I can't find listed on the OLC site!  Anyway it went like this:  Fremont Peak, Pinnacles, Panoche, Los Banos, Tracy, Mt. Hamilton, Loma Prieta, Paicines, Hecker Pass and back to Hollister.  The longest time I've been in a glider!  I took a lot of pictures some of which are here:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/98883461@N00/sets/72157623978379528/