Twin grob over golden hills
For Labor Day weekend, we drove to Tehachapi, California to fly gliders and hike the southern end of the sierra nevada mountains. There is a sailplane homebuilders workshop at the mountain valley gliderport in Tehachapi every year at this time. Met up with a number of old friends that I hadn't seen for some time including Larry and Jane who run the airport. We stayed with our friends Jim and Misti.
Jeff Byard's TG
The weather for soaring was good on Saturday with flights up into the owens valley area and back. We got there too late to take advantage of the weather, rigged and tied down the glider planning to fly on Sunday. The wind really blew on Sunday and we mostly flew the Tehachapi convergence, some wave, and an occasional thermal for a two hour flight. It's amazing that any thermal held together well enough to be useable in the wind. The 302 was showing 29 knots from the west most of the day, the lift was strong and easy to work. The problem was that I could only get to 9200 feet and never left the valley.
Tehachapi from ASH-26E
Most of my flights this year have been in good soaring weather and I had mostly been flying straight. I've had this ship for less than a year so it was good to learn a little more about flying the ASH-26 in the varied conditions of the Tehachapi Valley. Seems that every glider model has it's own personality and it takes me a season to learn how to fly it well.
The soaring on Monday didn't look too good on the forecast so we drove around the mountains to the north of the gliderport. Helped a young couple with a baby get to a auto repair shop near Lake Isabella after we came upon them in their broken down car. Had a great soak at remington h0t springs then back to Tehachapi.
We had dinner with our friend Misti at a very nice Thai restaurant in Tehachapi. After the great meal, we picked up the glider trailer and towed it home to Boulder City. The glider was left tied down at mountain valley so that I could enter the dust devil dash the next Saturday. Will be hitching a ride from Bakersfield Airport with my friend Oscar after he gets off work. We'll see if it was wise to take the trailer home a week before the race.
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