Beautiful Day

Went flying this morning! I was on South Mountain, and the winds were coming in South with some cycles out of the East. It was my third day in a row launching here, and I felt strangely nervous having just spoken to some hikers about reserve parachutes. My lines were a mess, maybe? My dad and I worked on them until we were sure things were sorted out, and at the end, I wasn't sure if there had been a problem from the start :-).

I brought the wing up in a nice lull in the wind, feeling the warmth of what I hoped would turn out to be a thermal. I put my weight into my harness, and started moving backward (reverse launch); bringing the wing up with only a slight correction needed on the left side before I turned around and ran toward the edge. The wing was flying, then, so was I :-)! I was flying into thermals and turning 360s to keep going up (even though I needed some convincing from my dad to complete the first full turn). I do not like facing the mountain before I am over launch, but the lift was strong, and I went up. There was a hawk coring the thermal I was in, and it felt amazing to be looking down on him for once. I looked back at launch, and my dad was taking off. I saw him go thermal searching, but for once he had to follow me to find the really strong lift :-).

After about 20 minutes, I decided to head for the LZ. The thermals had some edges to them, and I worried about things that might happen on landing. My goal was to land without taking an approach over the wash-the bastard got me twice already this week! I set up by the ridge, getting a little flight extending lift before I made my final approach. I landed into the wind with a great flare (thanks to some actual winds in the LZ), kited the wing to a clear spot where I could pack up and enjoy the feeling of a great, safe flight. My dad landed soon after, and we packed up and headed home.

In celebration of our flying, I tried to burn down the kitchen with a new recipe for stir fry! It was delicious, but this oil I was using was not good for cooking.

I also went for a 60 mile bike ride, which was not nearly as exciting to talk about, but I can say that my butt hurts from it, and I was at mile 58 and feeling sad that it was almost over :-(. The sun was setting at this point, and I was listening to "Goodbye Beautiful Day". I could not have planned a better ending to that ride.