Bruce Engen - Italy Valley

Bob Grant - Going Down - Italy Valley

Dan Spiers and Mark Frutiger

Set-Up

A Beautiful Day at Dansville, NY

Chuck

Bob Roth - Take-Off

Scott Wise - Take-Off

Scott Rowe - Take-Off

Stoneybrook Park - Dansville, NY

Ron Letzin

Chuck

Bob Grant - Take-Off

Mark Frutiger

Scott Wise with a Great Run off Mt. Washington (Hammondsport)

Greg Lloyd - Canada - H-Port

Katrin Feeling the Paraglider

Mukrin Sisic Too late for Lift But They do much Better at Indian Cliffs

Bob Grant Flies His Fusion at Mossy Banks Overlooking Bath, New York

Bob Helps Scott on Take-Off

Bob Grant

With the wind being strong in the morning at the Flight Park we decided to try Hammondsport New York a mountain site fifty miles south of Rochester. After hiking near Naples we contacted Scott Wise who lives close to the take off and he was about to try a flight so we drove to take of and assed the wind conditions and decided that we would try a flight although the wind was occasionally gusting to over twenty mph. With my encouragement Scott was first to get off and had a good take-off with the left tip lifting a little more than normal but Scott was soaring so I hurried into my harness and scooted off the west take-off. The wind was strong so we did not get very high like three to five hundred feet above take-off with Scott usually above me as he flies a small Fusion which handles more wind that my larger one. Scott made a trip down to the south end of the ridge where the jail is located and I followed and Scott came back with good height but I had lost lots of lift on my journey back and I was below take off a hundred feet or so but gained to well above take-off quickly. After an hour or so the wind let up a bit and then I was able to get above Scott for the rest of the flight and at one point I used a bubble to get nine hundred and seventy feet above take-off which was the highest that we got to. After a couple of hours Scott decided to land and because the church landing field had been recently ploughed there was not a good landing field to land in so we used the soft ploughed field and Scott beaked in and fifteen minutes later I came in on my wheels and the nose came over fast and slammed into the soft dirt making a huge cloud of dust and covering me with dirt. I think that I should have tried a stand up landing. We both had smooth flights and enjoyed the air very much. After I returned home, I realized that I must have left my sunglasses in the landing area and Scott returned the next day and found them in the grass where I had broken down. Thanks Scott.

Bob Grant and I met at H-Port this afternoon and had a fine time flyin'. While the wind seemed a bit strong and a little westerly, once in the air it was nice. Amazingly smooth, in fact. I was 300 over with my first pass. Can you say "buoyant".

I launched at 6:26 pm and Bob followed about 5 minutes later. We both popped off from the south launch since that favours a more westerly wind. My max alt was a bit more than 1.5k over the LZ, and Bob reported 1.8K over. That was a sweet cycle and very Wonder-like - but then the whole flight could have qualified as wonderish. I took a short out and return to the knoll above the jail and back. I started at 1250 AGL and only lost 200 ft in the process. As I said, buoyant.

Before the end of the flight the wind began to rotate to the north and that may have been when the high cycle was triggered. Most of the time, however we both were between 1K and 1.2K AGL. Now and then the corn field behind launch would release a mild little thermal which didn't hurt at all.

It began to get a little late, so around 8:26 I headed out and ended up landing by the church at 8:31 pm for 2 hrs 5 minutes. Bob came out and touched down maybe 10 - 15 minutes later.

Allen Ahl Landing Approach

Oded, Bob and Scott

Friday May fourth we made another trip to the Finger Lakes and this time our friends Eric and Mary accompanied us. We met Scott Wise at his home in Bath around noon and decided to check out Mossy Banks and found that the wind was crossing and so we decided to hear for Indian Cliffs which is about another forty miles and by the time we collected Scott's glider transport tool we ended up getting to Indian Cliffs around four o'clock and quickly set up after rolling our gliders up the hill on Scott's cart. Just when we were near the top, Mary's dog Tess got into a battle with a porcupine and of coarse had about forty quills in her mouth so Eric and Mary worked on removing the quills. Scott took off first as I am a big chicken and after about five minutes we could see that Scott was well above take-off so I hustled off the hill and found some great thermals taking me to almost 3,700 feet and I stayed up for one hour and thirty five minutes when the lift subsided. Scott stayed up for fifty two minutes and landed with his dog Lobie greeting him in the landing area.

Saturday morning we went for a hike in Hammondsport and called on Scott around noon when we decided to fly at Mossy Banks. Mossy is a shear cliff take-off and so I got my nerve up and was the first off with the help of Oded Kalir who showed up while we were setting up our gliders. It turned out to be a great take-off in a lull between the stronger cycles and immediately I was up to six hundred feet above and soon I was in thermals which eventually took me to 2,020 feet. The wind was sometimes strong and blowing the thermals back quickly and at one point in my flight I had the wires go slack which I did not like and Scott also reported that he had a similar experience on that day. I was having a good time working the thermals and stayed up for three hours and five minutes. I think that Scott said that he stayed up for two hours and Oded had a one hour flight.

Sunday morning we checked with Scott who said that the predicted wind would be too strong so we went for a hike through the gorge at Grimes Glen in Naples and after that we stopped at Harriett Hollister Spencer Park and found Bob Roth and Doug Fen there and we watched as they tried to stay up in a thirty degree left cross wind without success so we headed home and later heard from Mukrin that he flew at Mossy Banks on Sunday as the wind calmed down later in the afternoon. There is a video of Mukrin's flight on our Paragliding webpage. Looks like he had some great lift and landed on top.