Sunday, July 20, 2014

Calm Before the Storm

After four long wingless days in Kauai with the family we were headed to the airport. We were driving through Anahola, and Donna cautiously looked over to me, not sure if she should say it, but then she did: There are two wings in the air. Sure enough, I watched Joe and Courtney fly over my head. Argh, so hard to enjoy watching others fly when I haven't had a fix for four long days. Joe did chat an offer to lend me a wing and harness. Thanks, Joe. I declined in order to spend some time with the wife and kids.

I woke up Saturday morning, the sun was shinning but it was coming, Wali a tropical storm, I had to fly today before getting shut down for who knows how long....maybe days. I can't go many more days without a flight, I will be miserable, ok more miserable than I usually am. I tried to finish some work Calmly but it didn't last, the chatter box started to blip, blip, blip, Alex was hiking. That's it! I Stormed off to Kahana.

I picked up Ike on the way,  we were both anxious to see his new Tala from BGD. We parked at the trail head and had to wait out a strong squall.  Heading up we were joined by Marc, a new monkey from Soar Kahana Academy. Alex was laying out his wing after a quick top landing to hide under one of the Lake Huts. Visitor Danno was getting ready. It was a bit strong when Alex launched, we knew it was ok after his third or fourth high five fly-by. Marc launched, perfectly, got out front and soared out over the bay and had a perfect landing.

Alex, Danno, Ike and I were the only ones in the air on this last day before Wali.  But soon stragglers were hiking to launch. Alex crossed the bay but Danno and I got denied at the grovel pit, finally making it over on round two. We boated around to Kualoa and my GPS started to blink, I had already turned off the sound to save what little life it had but now it was on its way out.

Arriving back to Kahana ridge I could see McStalker had followed Ike and Alex over to Punaluu. Sandy was now in the air in her Sport 3 so we had one of Bruce Goldsmiths first wings and his latest wing in the air at the same time. I buzzed BigMike and Reaper as they set up on launch. I was done. Two plus hours in the air, and I was getting a little hungry, no GPS, and Reaper had some frostys in his truck.

I needed that shot in the arm, it felt good to be in calm Hawaii air again. Last night on the way home from AlanG's amazing circus cabaret act, Wali arrived with heavy rain, thunder and lightning. The storm was here and thankfully after a great day of flying.

Roll Call: Alex, Ike, Danno, Sidehill, Marc, Stalker, SandyJune, TommyRD, Reaper, BigMike, Ginny, Johnimo, Harvey, Serena and of course Lupo.  I heard some chat from Makapuu, sounded like Frank, 5-0 and Jorge.

It was Time to Fly, I got my gear and went! Where were the rest of you?



Alex's photos

Jeff's photos

5 comments:

sandy said...

Nothing like a weather-imposed deadline to light a fire under my old tail and wing and make me charge (ever so carefully on my still decrepit knee) up the hill. Turned out to be a really lovely day with the nasty stuff arriving right on time around 6 pm. I had the hill mostly to myself as all the superships scattered to the four winds.

I'm super-stoked to have finally gotten a flight off of Kahana again, yet very sad to see my landing will have been the last there for awhile since the last night's storms have washed it away :-(

Thanks for the recap Sidehill.

Alex said...

Thanks for the writeup Thom! That was a gorgeous day. I stuck my photos at the bottom of your story. Including one picture of the washed out LZ.

Stalker said...

Beautiful day. Ike actually followed me to meet Alex at PUN. Ike got up though, I didn't. I landed out at Ching's. A few photos here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/125370786@N05/sets/72157645812920435/

-Jeff

Gravity said...

Same boat for me. Watching, launching, retrieving, and rescuing paragliders for a whole month and only getting two flights, I charged out to Kahana, raced up the hill, hucked Big Mike, and threw myself off of low launch. Raced up to the top, slid across the bay at 1,500 ft, flew to Chinamens Hat, and raced back to Kahana for a frosty Torpedo at 47 mph.
Just in time to make the show, and beat the storm.
Good day
Reaper

Rich. said...

Where was this Cabaret at? I inquired 3 Times on the chatterbox to no avail. First time that ever happened to me. Did I do something wrong?