Sat: First Pine Flights of the Season

From: BH
Activity_Date: 5/119/01
Remote Name: 4.35.217.74

Comments

Benson, Dan, Walter Fontana, Eddie and I headed for Pine this morning expecting deep snow on the north side after weekly reports from the Forest Service defending the late opening. Thanks, guys, for not waiting until Memorial Day weekend or later to lift the gate cause the road was clear and I counted only three dinner table-sized snow drifts at the top not large enough to stall a Honda.

We arrived at 12:30 or so, just as cloud cover began shading the valley. It was too warm at launch, cycles up the front were weak but the mountains were glorious and the cumis hinted at a developing convergence. We probably arrived 30-minutes late for the conditions but much patience, some serious scratching along the spine and a few weak thermals to 7300 led us into the convergence where we boated around at 9400 or so, still 1000+ under cloud base.

Benson and I ended the day soaring above Sundowner Ridge, the site of last weekend's great adventure. Take my word for it, it's better viewed from above than below. I landed at Wolf's Bar expecting a party on opening weekend. Instead, I was greeted by an attention-starved emu looking for a hand-out and a friendly but heavily tatooed ex-biker wanting to know if I inflated that thing with air before or after jumping off the mountain.