
On Wednesday July 7, two windowless cargo vans full of Chelan newbies headed east from SeaTac, stopping for supplies in the suburbs which no doubt left a wave of Neighborhood Watch calls to the authorities in our wake. I rode shotgun for Marcel. In the back we had the irrepressible Nour and a young race volunteer named Cody. Nour had met Cody at the airport and somehow convinced him that his paid ticket on a comfy bus coach would be no match for a dark berth on the sheet metal of our cargo hold. Four hours later they emerged into the bright sun of the volunteer camp, like yogis climbing out of the sand pit. In the other van, Marc navigated for Marissa. Her faith in his situational awareness was somewhat shaken by the fact that for the last 90 minutes of the trip, Marc would peer up at each peak visible from the road and say "There, I think that's the launch".

The wind dropped to light/variable the next day and it was on! Our molester van handled the road to launch admirably and by early afternoon five of us were airborne. Conditions were strong, with sharp edges. Nine grand was doable with your eyes closed over the Butte. At one point I saw Marissa far below me out front, a couple minutes after I had hooked a nice climb. I made a mental note to remind her that in the future, she should head for the nearest climbing glider. A couple turns later I lost sight of her, until I looked up and saw she was specked out a thousand feet above me! Later she reported that this was her first time flying thermals, and that she was heeding the advice, "if it feels rough, you just need to sit there for a while until it feels normal."
A few of us were a bit behind the curve with the big air wing control, but eventually Drew lobbed across the river and we followed him into a playground of cumulus and strong climbs, with top of lift between 10 and 11 grand. We figured this was the daily routine, so we didn't feel too bad bumbling around towards Mansfield for an hour before turning around and easily making the soccer field for our first practice task. At one point a 747 flew underneath Marc, pulling what appeared to be pitch control maneuvers, adding to the surreal vibe. After debriefing with a local pilot who flew down from Leavenworth, we learned that the day was in fact exceptional, if a bit strange atmospherically, as we had a curious band of tiny clouds dropping evaporating bands of virga above the layer we were flying in. We didn't realize it would be our last day of flying cloudstreets for the whole trip, and while it was a sweet intro to the place, now in hindsight it feels like we showed up at Pipeline on the best swell of the winter, only to hop a couple shoulders before calling it a day.

In Hawaii, like Kal-El on Krypton, Pete is a normal enough guy who happens to have a ton of energy and great stories. Take Pete and drop him into Chelan, and suddenly the Reaper is unleashed. He's everywhere at once. Setting up launch. Fluffing and hucking. Retrieving people off the flats almost at the same time, like batting fly balls to himself. As soon as all the pilots are accounted for, the party begins. Reaper is at the bar. He's at the lake. He's playing pool. He's in the pool. He's at the casino. The hung-over youngsters in the volunteer camp were telling stories every morning about not being able to keep up with the legend. He is the Chuck Norris of paragliding. You drop your wing near Reaper and it will fluff itself without being asked. Collapses are afraid of taking Reapers.

The tall climbs were a bit of a novelty for the area, Matty said he had never flown to 14K feet in Chelan and was grinning ear to ear hearing about everyone getting specked out in the first few days. I believe the Monkeys' altitude record for the week was Marcel's 13,800 feet on task 2, a day we were sent north into the mountains to Stormy Peak before heading southwest to the girthy and intimidating Dick Mesa, then crossing the Columbia to Farmer, backtracking to Waterville, then back to the soccer field. There were some nice convergence lines setting up between Farmer and Waterville, thousands of feet above my head on the first pass, where I groveled low for an eternity, frisbeeing along and staying alive long enough for my limp noodle of a climb to join forces with some stronger tendrils and get me back over 10K feet and back into the game again. Marcel saw me struggling down in the dust after his own low save, and selflessly spiraled down to mark the lift and pull me back up. Just Kidding! Actually, he shed a solitary tear before climbing two vertical miles and hammering into goal, on a day when the dirt claimed many expert pilots, including all of the Hawaii veterans.

It was too good to be true, and I was still a long way from the soccer field, but after a couple minutes I accepted my fate, and settled back into the harness for a buoyant glass-off ridge soaring glide to goal, accompanied by a couple hawks from Central Casting. This day was the best showing for the Oahu rookies. In addition to the four pilots in goal, Marissa got extra credit by tagging Stormy Peak proper (because why not, we're here to fly after all) before trimming Matt Henzi by a hair at the Columbia river crossing. Nour made it ten miles up the course line through the mountains before landing out safely in a valley bottom, a respectable XC flight by any measure.

The biggest lesson of the week was the value of the group: a lone pilot is pretty hosed trying to fly XC in non-obvious terrain. It doesn't matter how good you are, the math just doesn't work out for a pilot that gets isolated. Pilots who bombed out were in excellent company throughout the week, including Austin Cox, Matt Henzi, and Donizete Lemos. Nick Greece said it best: "You're not smarter than the brain. Stay with the Brain!" I'm looking forward to flying some new lines at home, with friends, learning from the Monkey Brain on our humble little rock.
Thanks for reading!
6 comments:
Thank you for the Excellent writing. You stored and delivered the experience very well Patrick!
too bad you missed the part when Pete turned into "Inspector Reaper" and solved the case of "The Missing Glider"
That was great write up on the whole experience had by all. Best week of the year for sure. I'm glad to be home from the dust and the heat, but it sure was fun.
Really enjoyed the story, thanks for letting me fly vicariously.
Patrick,
Thanks for the story! You are a gifted writer, I felt like I was riding shotgun with ya. The porcupine part reminded me of the movie Sideways when a similar experience was had with ostriches!
Nick
Sorry for the late reply on this. Just wanted to say that I was super impressed with the monkeys at the Ozone Chelan! You guys killed it! Still can't forget the ear-to-ear grin on Marissa after flying her first thermal! Yes... at Chelan and in a comp. Great writeup, Patrick.
JK
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