Wednesday, October 15th - Bristol Mountain (really, Stid Hill)
SOUTH BRISTOL, NEW YORK 35 miles south of ROCHESTER, NEW YORK

A beautiful Autumn day. Too beautiful to remain at work after missing Monday's epic conditions at Hammondsport (where Ryan interrupted his 4 hour flight to call me from a grand over to let me know what I was missing). But this time I brought my camera!
This is what it looked like as I waited for the 10 minute construction traffic signal-


We loaded up my little Baja and Karl, Mark, Moritz and I headed up top. Karl brought both a PG and HG, the rest of us were HG. After the huge carry-in, me with my bum knee, we set up and thankfully started seeing some cycles. But Mark launched and sledded, Karl launched and sledded (PG), Moritz launched and sledded... hmmmm... kind of wishing I didn't blow off work today... I waited for Alex to arrive for his first Bristol launch (but not his first high flight), hoping for something to change... And change it did. A huge bank of stratus clouds was moving in, killing any chance for a soaring flight and I bagged the idea of launching to help get Alex's glider in. Right when I got unready to fly- it starts cycling in again! So I get my layers back on, get into my harness... and it dies... Oh one of those days! A guy named Sven, a former RAFer, rode into launch and kept us company while we watched crows and vultures get up across the valley. Nothing blowing into launch well enough for me to join them, especially with my knee protesting any real running. Finally I dove off and headed along the ridge- to find nothing to get up in. I scratched closer than I usually do (no turn now in my glider), but didnt get up. I set up a landing and had some fun dodging those posts along the driveway on final... Why do I always set up so much shorter than I need to??? Oh well, Mark captured the moment on film and I actually had a nice landing after pushing out a bit to avoid them. They are actually just a bit more than a glider's width apart. Better still when some wuffo parks in the road to watch!

We all headed quickly up top to see Alex off. Karl was determined to beat my current "Flight Of The Day" status, as his Saturn was all set up... He milked that sledder for all it was worth but my 8 minute 20 second flight held the honors. Alex was ready next and he executed a perfect launch. He headed across the valley and continued with a perfect approach and landing right in the "cool pilot" landing area by the access road.
It wasn't a total waste of a work day (but close to it), and it was great to enjoy the riot of colors this particularily beautiful Autumn is producing. We should be getting some more nice flying weather this weekend, so hopefully it won't be the last of our unique kind of leaf peeping.

Flights: 1

Airtime: 8 minutes

Alt2: zero....