nuthouse to fillmore

[andy dainsberg]

Hit the nut today w/ Marty. ~Nice launch cycles- -off at 1145. Fun flying along the points and up to Chief in semi-chunky air. - never cracked 6k but had a nice tailwind. We left W repeater ridge and hovered up in a minor but productive convergence between E repeater and Boyds. Got to the ridge with ok alts; scratched up & eventually climbed SP Peak. Took the glide out to Fillmore for a couple ice parachinos at starbucks. Fun to fly close with Marty- an elite climb maxxer and glide seam chooser. OJ went out of his way to retrieve us-… felt great - many tanx brudda!

[DeVietti_Marty]

Big thanks to Andy for showing me the way to Fillmore from East Repeater and beyond...it made much more sense as he went along (I don't think I would have put it all together if I were alone though). I wanted to dive in low and bench up Santa Paula ridge but Andy's sage advice mentioned "it's almost always a scratch fest" and fortunately I slowed down and we tanked up enough to escape the gravity of the nice green lawns below and connect JUST high enough to make it up and over SP Ridge... Beautiful change of scenery, and nice views of the Topa Topas. As Andy put it "It was an arial buffet of conditions today" which translates in my mind to mean smooth glides, to strong climbs, wind blown thermals, inversions, convergence, and full on turbulent air at times. We landed in a HUGE green school yard in the middle of Fillmore...ahhh, packing on grass.....mmmmm.

OJ IS MY HERO, by the way, and has a lot of Karma credit with me, (AND my wife for getting me home early!)

I may have to get a Starbucks Card. Those things are yummy.