umpteenth Florida update

[Paul Tjaden]

Hey all you Frozen Yankees,

Sounds like decent flying days are few and far between up there so I thought I'd make you jealous and tell you about last Saturday in FL. I mean.....if even Tom McG is flying at the training hill, things must be pretty bad.
Good turnout at Quest with about 10 gliders set up by 1:00. Mitch Shipley and I got things started at about 1:30 with Mitch trying his first foot launch behind a tug with his Target and having NO problems getting airborn in just a few steps. I followed in my Combat and, brimming with overconfidence, pinned off at 1,200' in what I thought was strong lift. Unfortunately it was only about 50 to 100 fpm and I was only able to climb a few hundred feet before it pissed off. It was a blue day and I managed NOT to find anything worthwhile and landed after about 30 minutes. Undaunted, I found another $20 and headed back up where I steadfastly stayed with the tug until 2,500 feet showed on my vario. I soon joined Mitch and another friend, Fred, well to the east and had a great time hanging around the edge of Clermont, about 5 miles away at about 4K. Flew for about an hour and a half watching the boats and skiersplaying on the lakes below and then headed home cause I was getting a bit cold. After all, it was 80 degrees on the ground making it only about 66 at 4K. Thought I might freeze!!!!! Lauren had a great save over the field while I was re-launching but landed after about an hour of scratching low. It was a difficult day if you didn't get off to the east a ways. She tried again later but caught my stupidity and pinned of early in what appeared to be good lift but ended up dying quickly.

Anyway, we all had great fun and then we had the troops over for burgers and played Gary Smith's DVD which everyone thought was great and which made me homesick for Woodsock and all you guys. Come on down and warm up your cold and muddy feet.

Paul

[hang_pilot]

Hi, Paul-

Alek and I are road-tripping your way: 3/15 - 3/23. We might fly some sites on the way down, chasing w/x, so we don't have an exact arrival in Orlando, but I'll let you know. Anyone else interested, give me a call or send me a pm.

Looking forward to seeing you and Lauren!

~Daniel
301-275-6584

[Paul Tjaden]

Hey, that's great, Daniel. Let us know when you are getting close to FL. We'll put out the welcome mat.

Paul

[silverwings]

Paul, what is the story about Quest? I remember hearing about it closing but you keep posting about flying there. Where do you live relative to Quest and Wallaby?

[Paul Tjaden]

Hey John,

We live just 4 miles away in Groveland and Quest's demise has been somewhat exagerated. It's still open and will be for the foreseeable future. It's been operating on a bit of a skeleton crew but Jim Prahl is instructing and doing some tandems and we haven't had trouble finding a tug pilot except one day when Lauren had to wait for Russel to show up. You can still get a room upstairs, etc. You won't find the large groups of people like you used to. Things are pretty quiet during the week with just Lauren and I and occasionally one or two others but there are usually 8 or 10 of us on weekends if the flying looks good. I am sure that they will close eventually but for now, it's open.

Paul