Site Improvements

The forecast was for strong east winds and sunshine above the valley floor. Easterlies are fairly common in the wintertime around here, but east-facing launches are rare. I hadn't flown for awhile, so I decided to give Evans Creek a try. Evans is an east site that I'd flown less than a dozen times, and only a couple of those flights resulted in actual soaring. The interesting thing about it is that, even if the wind is howling elsewhere, it will assuredly be light at Evans launch.

Rick had wanted to do some site maintenance here among other places, so we agreed to meet up. He'd decided ahead of time that he wasn't likely to fly his paraglider here because of the strong wind forecast, which was far above the red zone for his craft. I'd flown my hang glider in winds up to 30 knots on the coast, so I wasn't concerned. Besides, I was aware of the sheltering effects of the terrain at this site. With my chainsaw and maintenance tools in my truck I met Rick in Rogue River, which like Grants Pass was still enveloped in fog. It began to thin as we approached the landing zone however, and we eventually were treated to a good dose of sunshine.

We worked at launch for an hour or so. There were cycles that rolled up the face at 12 mph, but in between were lulls of calm. In a sustained 12 mph wind, I have no qualms about ridge soaring, but the lulls make it difficult to maintain altitude. The Sexton Windtalker was reporting 17-27 kt winds, so the Evans damping effect was once again influencing the local conditions. Rick and I decided that it was probably howling a few feet above where we stood, and he didn't want to take a chance at getting caught up in it. I began to set up my wing anyway, content with even a short flight on such a beautiful day. Rick continued to fine-tune launch as I did so.

After launching I made a few passes along the ridge. As I'd predicted, the wind was just below the threshold for sustained ridge lift. I worked it as long as I could while taking in the view from my aerial vantage point. Twenty minutes or so after launching I landed in the lz, walked to the break-down area and disassembled my wing. Rick met me shortly after.

It was such a beautiful day that we decided to do some exploring. Last summer Rick had driven to the top of Elk Mountain, which was not too far north, and discovered that there were some towers planned for the summit. This is usually good news for us footlaunched pilots because it means maintained access and usually a cleared area to launch from. Unfortunately it often means locked gates to protect the equipment, but a diplomatic phone call to the right people can sometimes yield access. When we got to the summit at around 4,500 ft asl, we looked around and found a spot that showed some potential for a launch and discussed lz options based upon the sink rates of our respective wings. Given the distance to the first reachable clearing, this was looking like a hang gliding site. Although they usually need bigger areas to land in than paragliders, hang gliders have a shallower glide angle and can fly farther to reach those bigger areas. We also noted how strong the wind was in the trees, confirming our previous suspicions about the actual wind conditions.

Rick still had the exploring bug gnawing at his brain, so we did a bit more exploring. He assured me of a 'short cut' that would eventually take us out to I-5 via the Jumpoff Joe Creek drainage. I used to live in that area but had never explored this far up the drainage before, and I was game for an adventure so I followed him down the mountain. We worked our way down the rutted road through some beautiful and remote scenery and eventually re-emerged into civilization. At the I-5 onramp we parted ways and went our separate directions.