Yesterday morning I drove back up to Chewelah and drove by Inklers to find everyone had gone to the casino for breakfast. I hung out with them as they finished and half headed for home and the other half of us headed for Parkers. This is the landing zone.
I initially had said I wasn't going to fly and wasn't going to take my wing but I thought I might do some kiting or ground handling and took my gear. I parked my truck at the landing zone and tossed my gear in Steve's truck for the ride up. As we were heading up he was oohing and ahhing over the weather and how perfect the day looked for flight.
This is the lower launch for Parkers which is at 3024 ft elevation. The mountain sits just south of Quartzite mountain which sits right above the town. At the end of the valley just right of top center sits Inklers which the top launch is at 2368 ft elevation. Looking at my Garmin at the end of the day I saw that my heart rate was way elevated from the time we started driving up to the launch site.
We then headed to the top launch which is far scarier. As we were driving up Steve was espousing the grandeur of the tree and as we pulled up to park we found it like this. Lightning had hit it a few days ago and exploded it. That line down the tree is where the lightning traveled and it exploded wood out in shards. The bark was scattered around and some pieces were 60 to 70 feet from the tree.
The top launch site is REALLY steep and I am not sure I will launch there for quite a while. Everyone else was more into the lower launch.
Amazing how the lightning blew the tree apart.
So we drove back down and I put myself into loop. I had my wing and the winds were really nice but the fear I felt was overwhelming. I couldn't make the decision for a longtime. Brandon was all in and he got setup and launched at 1:45.
He flew out and then caught lift and the elevator took him up. We watched him circle up a few thousand feet and I just had rocks in my stomach. I couldn't stop trying to analyze what the flight would be like, wanting to land in the meadow close to the launch, being petrified, and feeling extremely unsure. My rational self was egging me on with the logic that I have the ability to do this while the rest of me was screaming in fear.
So I fought myself and managed to finally get my wing out and get things ready for a flight. I almost had myself in tears from fear and I can only thank Tim for being there to help me get through it and launch. It was a serious battle with my head and my fear and he understands as he has the same battle but he has learned to deal with it over the years.
It was over an hour of being hooked into my wing and about a dozen attempts to get my wing in the air. Finally I managed a good launch and with Tim agreeing I turned and launched.
I got maybe 4 steps in before I was plucked up off the ground and into the air with a quick burst of lift. I can say absolutely that I was extremely gripped and the pucker factor was at max. Thankfully Steve had pointed out all the landmarks which made it easy for me to find my way.
You can see the top launch at the top of the center peak. I was REALLY focused on the shadow of my wing as it came forward or went back behind me and I was doing a ton of brake pulls to keep from pitching.
I got a bit of down air before getting over rock ridge where I got a little bump of lift. I then aimed for the grassy area on the left.
I got over the corner of the grassy area and found the ridge lift which was mild but allowed me to head north along the ridge parallel to the landing zone.
I made a turn to cross the road and fly out over the fields.
Steve and his hang glider were at the lz as he kept getting spit out of the thermals. I was worried about the trees a bit so I ended up coming in to land a bit high for landing by Steve.
There were pockets of lift that I kept hitting and I had to kick my speed bar a bit to help drop me the last few feet to land. It ended up a 1300 foot vertical drop from launch to landing and more than twice Inkler which is a 100 feet higher than Saltese.
I had my wing packed up and in my truck as Steve tore down his hang glider. Sara pulled up in Steve's truck that she drove down from the launch and after a bit we heard over the radio from Brandon, "I'm over the van". That meant he had flown back to Inklers. A bit later he radioed that he had landed. His flight was well over an hour and he went 10 miles from launch to landing.
Here is the video of my whole flight.
I decided to head for home and made it a bit after 4pm, in a daze. The come down from bigger flights is extreme for me still and the adrenaline dump that happens is really rough. Actually every flight I have done on my own so far has had the adrenaline dump afterwards, it's just gotten more intense with the increase in heights and distance.
I remembered through the haze that I had to get grain this morning so I got the trailer hooked up and empties loaded.
I seriously needed a shower after the day and then soaking felt quite good.
I've been to town for grain this morning already then will empty it in a bit. I have to work in the gardens, run up to the high school to drop off a form, pull more weeds as always, I need to flake my wing out to empty out any bugs or debris, and I'm not sure what else right now.
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