Nice calm flight. After I landed I ran the tank dry doing taxi practice. I’ve installed night eye brand cord ratchets on the A assists and it is a real improvement. Instead of trying to move the tiny cam release on the old ratchet all I have to do is pull the cord and it releases.
797 back dated from Monument Valley
This is out of sequence but I forgot to record it.
I borrowed a 28 meter Lift from Bob Hanna and took a spin around the park.
796 shell creek
Another picture perfect day and nice low and slow flight.
Getting close to another century flight.
795 at Shell Creek
No drama. Flew low and enjoyed the sights.
1hour 15 minutes
Smooth
Dallin and Russ Bateman
One year several years ago, during The Gathering at Monument Valley, Russ and a very young Dallin spotted a Steer’s skull on a tandem flight. They landed, retrieved the skull and flew back to Gouldings Airstrip. It was one of those EPIC father and son moments.
Imagine the stories that boy will tell his grandchildren fifty years from now. Bravo!
793 k794
Two quick flights at Shell Creek. Calm air with light ground fog. 25 mph smooth winds at 700 feet.
No drama.
Spoke with the airstrip manager and got permission for Tom Spears to land and leave his trile at Shell Creek when he comes to visit.
791 & 792
OTwo flights this week. The first one was at Placida. Mike asked me to come out to help a new trike pilot. I was the first to arrive and went up for a quick flight waiting on the others. When I saw them arrive and begin to set up I landed and introduced myself.
We were not able to get him launched before I had to leave for a doctor appointment. He was a bit timid when it was time to commit and aborted before getting the wing fully loaded.
The second flight was a little dicey. Mike and I launched in fairly thick ground fog and once airborn were absolutely unable to see the ground. We flew east for about 5 miles then Mike decided to go for a new personal altitude record and I played around at 700 feet. The fog was getting thicker instead of burning off like we thought. It was still pretty close to the ground …. Probably thinning out at 100 feet.
Mike had no problem and descended to a perfect landing on the first pass. I on the other hand, circled the field for at least 10 minutes looking for a hole and failing that, looking at the few landmarks that were poking through the fog to be sure I was going to come in on the runway. Landing was a non event…. I committed and lined up to come in from the North end of the runway. It was a total white out for a few seconds but quickly I saw the Eastern edge of the runway and set down adjacent to the DC-10 hanger.
790 and two NFD
Beautiful but hardly good flying.
Got in a short bumpy flight at Placida after waiting an hour for the wind to come down. Then sat through two days of fog waiting for it to burn off.
Shell Creek Airpark 789
I woke up at 6am to clear skies and no wind so I pulled on the silks and headed out to Shell Creek. It wasn’t planned, I didn’t do any of the normal things I usually do the night before a flight so I wasn’t too surprised when I discovered that the battery was dead. Last flight at Placida I’d had to jump it and apparently wasn’t in the air long enough to give the battery a good charge. So… I laid out so that the trike was at the corner of the field and parking area. I put the wood block in front of the tire and gave it a jump. The wing caught on something (probably the truck antenna or parking stump) and I was able to recover it from a tip touch and make a nice take off. bad technique….during set up.
Rest of the flight was smooth ….. Cool…..drama free.
788 Placeda
Good afternoon flight with Mike Otten and Mike Lange. Nothing fancy and no drama.
Powered Paragliding. A most Personal form of Flight 
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