Saturday, September 20th- Bristol Mountain

Ryan, Katrin, Jeff, Mark, Karl and me- making holes, filling holes, spreading grass seed... a real live work party at Bristol. Karl had already mowed it nice up there so now it's beginning to look like a regular launch instead of the dark side of the moon. Rick was attacking the LZ with the DR mower all afternoon (and missed some nice flying!) Daniel Spier and his wife, Mary, showed up along with Paul Senger and the Stoners. Mukrim, too. Couple of PGs launched and had some luck, Dan and Mark launched, then I barrelled off. For some odd reason I didn't take the time to set my nose angle, or yell "clear", so that's why I say "barrelled"... I scraped the brush at the edge a bit, but headed south and quickly got up. Sticky zipper, slight left turn still, but nothing was going to detract from the great flying that was turning on. Pretty soon it seemed everyone in the RAF (except for Rick and Moritz) was climbing high over Bristol valley, trading places and chasing each other around. The inversion was just below 750 meters and the sky was just beautiful cirrus. At one point I had Paul climbing up through me so I moved to what I thought would be better lift but what turned out to be just right in his way!!! Dan with the Atos, all the PGs... what a blast! When it got really crowded and a little scratchy, I waved good bye and headed into the valley. Paul came out with me and I saw we may conflict in the landing area, so i turned in some zero sink so he'd beat me there. When I saw his approach, I copied and wound up having a perfect no-stepper just where the cars were parked. That like NEVER happens!!! Rick's picture was just a moment before I flared (and I scabbed it off his blog. )

sweet!!!

airtime:1:40

alt2:758 meters