Flying Torrey Pines

[mcelrah]

I have wanted to fly Torrey Pines since the mid-80s when I saw hang-gliding there. It's pretty much all paragliding now, particularly since it's light in the summer. So it was this week when I got out to San Diego for a conference and brought my wing. You have to be a P3 or else they charge you ~$250 for instruction/observing. Went out there three straight days after work and always missed the soaring window - kited a couple of times, got some free advice from Ki, the excellent Korean instructor. On my last day in town, I took affirmative action and ditched work at noon, got airborne at 1:40. It was scratchy but where there were bowls you could pop up if you got your body below the cliff edge. Not too crowded - ya gotta let the tandems have the cliff and swing out, but the lift band wasn't too narrow. Flew for 50 minutes, was trying to figure out how to land with kiters, not having enough ground clearance to do a full approach. On my last pass, I got high (~100 over), thought "it's always tempting to keep flying when you're high" and sure enough, totally lost it on the next pass and ended up on the (nude) beach. Didn't feel as bad when I saw that Ki and his tandem passenger were also hiking back up the cliff (twice). Parawaited for an hour or two, but lift remained marginal. Some locals can fool you 'cause they fly solo in tandem wings. Locals have superb kiting, ground handling and light air flying skills - one older fella also told me how to launch in strong wind by holding the D's, using your butt deep in the harness seat to wiggle the A's until you build a wall, then release the D's and the wing will come right up. I stayed close to launch the whole time on advice from one of the locals due to the light air - hope to cruise north past the golf course and south past the mansions someday... - Hugh

[Spark]

I'll be there (Torrey Pines) in two weeks for the ESRI conference.

I've found that the trick to staying up is to work the thermals. Although you might not expect them, they are there (i.e. over by the gold course, and in the gaps), and you can usually work one to several hundred over, which makes top landing easier.

I really hate landing on that beach. So far, it has only happened once.