Sauratown's Spring Flying by Doug Rice

Our sport definitely has it's ups and downs, it's highs and lows, and as pilots, our moods tend to reflect the successes and failures of our flights. For the new comers to hang gliding and paragliding whose frustrations in the early stages of learning the sports may leave you questioning your abilities, my advice is simply this: "hang in there." Even after years of flying, you'll still have "up days" and "down days." We all go though it but the good times and the bad times all seem to even out if you keep at it and don't give up. However, you'll never have one of those really great UP days if you stay home when it's flyable.

So far this year has been pretty good. January and February had a couple of great days that saw out and returns to Hanging Rock State Park. On March 20, four of us did the same out & return and then some with Jeff Reynolds making the trip almost three times during the one flight. April kept getting better with longer durations and higher altitude gains. On the 10th, Greg Willey and a friend flew Big Walker, VA in the morning and then Sauratown that afternoon. While I worked just above and behind the towers climbing slowly, Greg climbed like a rocket out in front of the mountain and left me playing catch up. I eventually topped out at 7000' msl and did an out & return flying for 2 hours and 25 minutes. Greg was gone by the time I landed but was very stoked from what I was told. He came back two weeks later and did it again on what was one of the best days this year: April 26 (a Sunday).

On that day, Greg played wind dummy for about ten of us. The air was still real light and the rest of us were still worried about going down even though Greg was climbing out front and going X-C into the wind with his paraglider (this recap is from my perspective and will not capture all the fun everyone had that day). I was first off with a hang glider and hooked right into a nice one climbing steadily while Jeff Reynolds and Jake Alspaugh followed. I felt good staying above them until the very top when I started loosing it. Jeff and Jake gained an extra 300' or so on me and headed down wind. I tried to get higher before leaving but ended up loosing more altitude so I went on anyway trying to chase the guys without king posts. Jeff was about 5 miles ahead and climbing after getting low. Jake was scratching low but was closer so I headed toward him. I was too low and landed with only 7.5 miles. Jake worked that little lift near me for over 30 minutes and eventually got back up and away. After hitching a ride back to the mountain, I headed out to pick up Jeff in Stuart, VA (19.6 miles). Just as I was arriving, Jake call Jeff on his cell phone from some place out in the boonies past Floyd VA with a very respectable 40.1 miles. Because we were already halfway there, the retrieval got us all back to Sauratown in time to watch the last paras fly.

May ninth had six of us set up at our back side launch but even though it looked real promising, only two got up while the other four went down. Doug Hileman flew to Walnut Cove while Jake made it to Summerfield (take note Jerry Campbell).

During April and May, there are several of us that will skip work during the week if the day looks good enough. May 12th was such a day but it looked as though no one else could play hooky with me. Fortunately, Tony Salvadore got talked into it. After watching weak looking conditions for about 20 minutes, I decided it was time to jump. Just then Jake arrived and started setting up as I launched. I immediately started climbing so Tony didn't waste any time and got into it as well. Nearing cloud base around 6800' msl I headed toward Mount Airy under a nice little cloud street. I worked every thermal and had some good runs each time I hit cloud base

now at 7100' over Mount Airy. The thermals got trashier when I cross over the Blue Ridge at Fancy Gap but I got back to 7000' one more time.

Back at Sauratown, Tony tangled around the base of thickening clouds which had shut down the lift when Jake launched preventing him from getting up. Tony landed after 45 minutes.

Most of the friendly clouds around me were dissipating as I past by Hillsville VA trying to reach another cloud street farther ahead. There was another ridge ahead of me past which I could see the I-77 bridge across the New River. I scratched low in front of the ridge but was slowly going down with very questionable and limited landing options. If I had gotten over the ridge, I'm sure my choices would have improved. The only spot that looked uphill, into the wind, without power lines through the approach or fences complicating matters, was a small rolling clearing on top of a hill surrounded by trees. I landed in waist high grass at an elevation 150' higher than Sauratown's launch. The 3 hour flight measured 41.4 miles.