Matt's Basic Life & Occasional Adventure: Annual Cody-Cookout-Fly-in-Palooza!

Saturday was the annual Fly-in & Family Cookout at Cody's. Greg, Bruce, Cody, Randy (hang-driver) and myself made it to the Brigham Towers launch by around 2 pm and set up under a mostly blue sky.

It was a beautiful, sunny day - with a temperature of about 75 degrees and a nice wind out of the SW at about 14-16.

A hint of fall was in the air, as some of the trees in Wellsville Canyon (over the backside) were just starting to change color.

(Image of Cody by Bruce H.) One by one, we all launched shortly after 3 pm. The plan was to get high enough to go over the back, and fly the 7.6 miles to Cody's place and land there to meet up with our families for dinner.

(Image of Greg by Bruce H.) As we ridge soared along the mountain tops in slightly textured air, each of us soon found a thermal in which to circle and climb. The climb rates were decent - anywhere from 100 to 1,200 fpm, but it kind of fell apart at about 1,000 over, leaving you in some in-between areas of sink. Cody and Bruce finally broke through the ceiling, finding a nice thermal farther north along the summit of the Wellsville Mountain Wilderness area. This one took them up to at least 10K (about 3,000' over the top), allowing them to drift over the back toward dinner-time! Greg & I continued searching, each of us on opposite sides of launch. Greg found a nice one and started climbing out. I tried to join him but only found sink below him. Greg stayed with it as it took him over the back also. After blundering through plenty of sink, I was back down to launch level when I finally found an elevator which took me to about 1,300' over. I wanted to be higher than that to go over the back, but I couldn't seem to bust through the ceiling, and I didn't want to be the only one to need a retrieval on the Brigham City side, so I just drifted in the lift as it carried me toward Cody's. The lift stayed together until I was over Sardine Summit, then it turned into sink,

so I just pointed toward Mt. Pisgah (AKA "Piskey") - which was about the half-way point to Cody's house. I arrived level with the top of Piskey, and started working the face in earnest. As I climbed over the top I could see the glide to Cody's house, but I knew I would need to get higher or find some lift along the way - or be forced to land in some less-than-friendly terrain.

I listened on the radio as, one by one, Greg, Bruce and Cody all landed at goal, and then encouraged me to "hang in there" and keep tryin' to make it too. After getting thrashed about for nearly an hour by some nasty thermals which never took me more than a couple hundred over Piskey, I finally said "uncle" and headed north to Dry Lake. I reluctantly came in for a landing on the east side of the highway, where Randy picked me up and we were off to the evening festivities. As we drove to Cody's, I began to second-guess my flying decisions, thinking that maybe I should have just gone for it anyway, even if I wasn't that high, and I "probably" would have made it. But, by the time we reunited with pilots & families, I had accepted the fact that my conservative flying choice to not go for it was just fine, and was, in fact very respectful to my family - after all, I am the pilot of my own ship! I am still getting familiar with my new glider, and am happy to live another day for many more flights to come!

The dinner was very nice - great food, along with families and friends. The ladies didn't tolerate too much hang gliding talk, and soon gravitated to their own table to discuss "more important" topics, I'm certain :-)

The kids were entertained with two rocket launches, and some fun go-kart rides!

We even found time for some friendly horseshoe competition - as Bruce and Greg are still comparing GPS flight logs! (Click Here to read Bruce's 'blog: http://hibbyblog.blogspot.com/2008/09/last-year-about-this-time-cody-and.html