Wave Camp report October 16

Rick Roelke continues his reports:

Thursday dawned overcast and fairly low. There were signs of decent weather north of Gorham, but it was out of reach. John Good and I went on a local scouting mission to see if we could find an emergency landing spot for the ridge northeast of Berlin. We finally found something, but it was not very pretty on close inspection. By the time we got back ~14:00 Walter S had launched his PW6 and was reporting an 8kt thermal over Mt Hayes. We were getting some spots of sun on the ground, and the atmosphere was particularly energetic and leaped at the first sign of insolation. Walter was practically giddy as we went from sunlit spot to sunlit spot always able to find reliable lift.

All I had to hear was 8kts and I rigged and launched. There was no wave to be found, but once again, the scenery was spectacular. The color was beginning to fade higher up on the hills. I however, took advantage of an overly optimistic low tow, and got to enjoy the last of the bright colors up close and personal. But the real scenery was at the tops of the mountains where even the fairly low peaks had a thorough frosting. On top of the Carters, it looked like a zillion flocked Christmas trees. Working thermals, I ventured over to the Pilot range (behind the Crescent range). To the north there was the sun. It looked pretty good for XC, but there were still the remnants of a high overcast that looked to be trouble. It was also getting late in the day and the thermals were now in the 2-3kt range, so I hung around the general area. I headed back up to Berlin to view our nasty road/field landing spot before heading in…

Today, Friday was forecast to be light to moderate east winds, with the hope of perhaps some wave from the Carter range, and some soaring on the east side of the Presidentials. No one was hurrying for an early start and I needed to get something in town. Coming back to the field at 9:30 I noticed a bank thermometer that was reporting 35degs, yipes…

I rigged and launched around 11:00. I towed up the center of the valley, looking for some sign of wave, but only found some bumpy air, no organized lift. John Good had launched first and was maintaining on the spur from Madison to Pine. Giving up on my wave search, I headed over to Madison still in tow. I arrived near the top of Madison in hopes that the ridge lift would work up there, but no dice. There was light ridge but not enough to maintain; however some decent thermals started to cook and we were able to climb to 5500 before long. I explored around the east side of the Presidentials, and found light ridge lift in the NE facing bowls. Again the view was amazing. At this altitude everything was covered in white ice. There were frozen waterfalls, and even some caves with ice stalagmites hanging from their roofs. While I could climb a little, I felt I needed to be a bit higher for the ridge to really work, so I went back to Madison for another

climb and then headed directly into the Great Gulf. I was now able to get as high as the west ridge along the Gulf. Every time I would get right into the back of the box canyon, I would climb another 50 or 100 ft. But try as I may, I could not get as high as the observatory. I was at eye level with a cog train, and it looked like they stopped to watch as I worked the ridge.

I continued around to Tuckerman and beyond, but again just enough lift to maintain, so I gave up my quest for the peak. A leisurely trip back, stopping to check for lift from the Carters, finally ridge soaring the back side of Mt Hayes, headed in. By late in the afternoon, it was downright pleasant on the ground, with the east winds remaining light enough to use runway 30 for most all of the launches…

Weekend outlook…

The weather outlook has improved for tomorrow (Sat). Looks as if it may be a repeat of today. Actually it is worthy of note that where we had winds of well over 100ks at altitude last weekend, the forecast for tomorrow morning does not have winds over 10kts anywhere below 25k. Not a wave day. But there is a good chance of thermals between 11:00 and 20:00 when it may start to cloud over.

Sunday still looks to be a washout. But if tomorrow pans out, we will have flown 8 of 10 days. Can’t complain about that….

Several PMSC members showed up today: Skip, Laurie, Pete, Sonny, Andy, and Tim all had good flights. Christopher and Rick had a late day tour of the summit of Mount Washington, all in remarkably still air. The spectacular scenery almost makes up for the lack of wave conditions.

The big spaghetti dinner is scheduled for tomorrow night (Saturday) at the "Gorham house."

P.S The 2010 Online Contest season has started.