Easter weekend flying

Heading back to Woodside after flying west to Deroche.

A "classic" Fraser Valley day on Friday as we drove out in the rain with a clearing forecast.  Misjudged it by an hour or so as we had to stand around on launch in the rain and hail until it finally cleared up but then it was time to fly!

I missed the first group of pilots heading west although it sounded like it was a bit early still for the crossing as most ended up at the Sandpiper airstrip at the base of Sasquatch Mountain.  I think Alex, Paddy, and Peter made it away.   When I got high enough for the crossing I was alone but made it easily enough from 1300m.  Lots of shade around Sasquatch and Deroche and I ended up turning around at Deroche where Alex and Paddy were returning from a run out to Dewdney.

Looking up Harrison River on the Sasquatch-Woodside crossing.

Sasquatch seems to harbour a lot of shade so I had to spend some time climbing in order to make the glide back to Woodside; Paddy had a bit of bad luck and ended up landing in Lenami's cutblock where a nude sunbather was enjoying his solitude while Alex and I climbed out above him.

The Bridal side was looking very shady and Andrew was reporting little luck over Green Hill and it was looking like it could be windy in the valley and into Hope, so several of us headed to Bear to see what would happen.  In the end I flew back to Harvest West where Alex was packing up, while Al landed at Harvest and Andrew landed in Agassiz.  Peter made it back to Woodside while Tom Chromy did fly to Hope and landed at the airfield.

Pemberton lower launch.

Saturday was looking like it could go either way, FV or Pemberton, so we opted for Pemberton.  It was already flyable when we arrived on launch around noon with Jim and Corinne top-landing multiple times.  I wanted to head over the back to the entrance to the Duffy Lake Pass so left the antennas at 2100m, finding a bit of a venturi at the entrance of the Anderson Valley as it was blowing SE up high.  Andrew and Simon followed and we made our way to the entrance to the Duffy when the high cloud moved in, making the SE more noticeable and not so nice.

Heading for the convergence near the airport.

Flying out towards the airport we found the convergence between the Lilloet lake SE and the Pemberton SW, which was enough to get us to the gravel pit.  Alex had flown to the Owl gap and Jim had flown across the Anderson valley before returning to launch.  Many others were still in the air as the high cloud had moved off and the sun returned.

Dressed for the cold!