Unlike our trip to Florida between Christmas and New Year's, this one featured a flawless trip down, lots of cloudbase flying, and no accidents. In other words, Doug and I had a great time.
Down on the Ranch
Christy Huddle
Unlike our trip to Florida between Christmas and New Year's, this one featured a flawless trip down, lots of cloudbase flying, and no accidents. In other words, Doug and I had a great time.
It was a little foggy about 500’ off the deck when our US Air plane touched down in Orlando around 10 am Thursday, February 11th. After retrieving our bags, we caught the Enterprise shuttle bus to their satellite facility where we picked up the car we'd reserved. Enterprise gives Wallaby Ranch pilots a discount so we only paid about $130 for the week's rental.
This time we elected to stay on the ranch. Not only is it much cheaper than the Super 8 (which gives Wallaby Ranch pilots a discount also - $37 for a room for two with the tax; the cabins cost $10 per person), it is much more convenient and you really relax a lot more. Our cabin had running water in the kitchen sink that you could only tolerate drinking if you'd lost your taste buds in the war. The overpowering sulfur smell in the Ranch water made brushing your teeth a real treat.
Shortly after our arrival at the Ranch, we were at work setting up the two K-2s we’d shipped down. I found a batten missing, but not to worry, Carlos the tug pilot whipped up another.
By 1:30 it was blue skies and cumies everywhere and I was airborne behind the tug. The K-2 isn’t nearly as easy to tow as the XC: lots of bar pressure and a little squirrelly. At 1,600’ the tug pilot waved me off and I immediately started circling and went right up. I boated all over the place, getting down to 1,300’ between clouds, but finding something right away. At one point I following Carlos (now flying an XS) to a distant cloud. I was losing altitude much faster than he was and had to turn around and hightail it back to the Ranch to land. My maximum altitude on that flight was 4,166’ and it lasted an hour and 25 minutes.
I parked the glider in the shade and partook of the daily lunch special on the Ranch (Brazilian cook/pilot Klebe does a pretty good job with the pots and pans). Around 3 p.m. I moseyed over to the NE corner of the field with my glider to get in line for my second flight. I was waved off in lift. The highest I got on this flight was only 2,549’, but it was 38 minutes of fun air.
Doug didn't fare quite as well, never getting above release altitude on his 20 minute first flight and not finding any lift after being waved off at 1,800’ on the second. He got 25 minutes on a third flight, but was complaining about how hard the glider was to fly. Done for the day, we folded up the gliders, leaving them on the control frames, and headed for Gary's Oyster House.
The next morning when we were setting up the gliders, I checked out the K-2 Doug was flying and found the mylar in both leading edges folded under from putting in the battens. No doubt it was like that yesterday when the glider just wasn't flying too well.
My first tow was a little after 12 noon. Cloud streets were forming and the wind was out of the south around 10 mph. My first tow was to around 1,800’ where I released in good lift. I continued climbing to cloudbase (3,910’) with Doug right underneath me. I bailed out when it threatened to suck me in and headed for another cloud upwind. No luck there: I met up with 450-500 down and was on the deck after a 38 minute flight. Doug saw me getting low and didn't follow, getting a 50 minute flight. He reported that the glider was much easier.
On my second flight I released at 1,600’, but didn't find strong enough lift compared to the drift. After 12 minutes I was on the ground. I hitched a ride to the cabin on one of the golf carts the Ranch rents (each month they have to use a different outfit since the carts get quite a beating) where I grabbed a Cliff bar for quick energy. I wolfed it down, put on my harness and was off again. I released into great lift and went right up to 3,260’. I lost it when I wouldn’t drift way past the Ranch and spent the rest of the flight working little bits of lift. All the turning started making feel a little woozy, so after 26 minutes of flying, I landed.
Doug took a second flight and got 25 minutes, reaching 2,700’ twice and ending with another no step flare. We broke down the gliders and put them in the hangar since the weather service was reporting a strong front coming through. The rest of the afternoon we sat in one of the many wood swings underneath one of the many Spanish moss laden live oaks. After watching some of the tandem flying at the end of the day, Doug and I went to a Mexican restaurant on Kirkham Road in Orlando that Ryan Glover had recommended. We found it (despite his directions) and had a great meal. There was a lot of congestion on the freeway in the Orlando area, probably caused by the Daytona 500 tourists, and we frequently found ourselves completely stopped in bumper to bumper traffic.
Just as well that it was blown out on Saturday and Sunday since I woke up with a pretty good head cold Saturday morning. Doug and I went shopping at the Beltz Outlet mall, saw a really dumb movie at Downtown Disney, and finished the day with a great meal at the Thai Orchid on Universal Boulevard (recommended by Malcolm).
On Sunday we got up really late and hung around the Ranch until that evening when we went to an Italian restaurant Malcolm recommended that wasn't too far from the Ranch. Upon leaving the restaurant (me driving) I made the only XC of the trip when I crossed the lanes on the restaurant side of the median only to find that there was no break in the median. I continued up and over the small curb, across the grass median, and turned left into the proper lanes. Thank God for rental cars.
It was much colder on Monday after the front had done its work. I should have paid more heed to the warning from the Extasy pilots who launched ahead of us. “It’s 42 at cloudbase.” I debated about putting on my winter coat, but opted to add another long sleeve T-shirt and light jacket to what I already had on. I launched at around 1 p.m.. It was a piece of cake to get to cloudbase (around 5,600’): big huge thermals going up fast. After 50 minutes, I had to work hard to find sink and then turn hard to get down in it without falling out into lift.
I landed, put on my down jacket and leg warmers, borrowed bar mitts from one of the tug pilots, and took off again. I released into a thermal and went up to cloud base: 5790’. Not cold at all this time and even stronger lift. I headed south (kind of into the wind) and passed over I-4 hoping to meet up with a cloud coming my way. The cloud took too long and I was nervous about being so far from the Ranch in sink. I turned tail and raced back, not finding any lift I felt safe working since I was feeling really low. I reached the Ranch with altimeter reading 700’ and landed shortly afterward for a 35 minute flight. This was one of those rare flights where the strongest lift registered on the vario's memory was a higher number than the strongest sink: +1,350 vs. -1,100. The averager showed 700 fpm for lift.
While I was battling out the lift and sink in my two flights, Doug was getting in an hour and half. We both took a late afternoon flight after an interesting dish of rice, raisins, green olives, and green onions. I released at 2,500’, hunted in vain for lift until I was down to 2,000’, took a picture of the Ranch (see below), put the camera away, and set up for my landing. Doug got in a 20 minute last flight.
Our stay over, we bagged the gliders, put them back in the shipping tubes in the hangar, ate the leftover meal from the Italian restaurant, spent the last night in the Super 8, getting up at 4:15 am to make sure we returned the rental car and got to the airport for our 7:10 a.m. flight. A few hours later we were back at work planning out the next trip to Florida.
