Woodside June 2

Another beautiful day in the Fraser Valley, and since it was a Saturday, the crowds were out!

It didn't really turn on until closer to 1pm, but once in the air it was easy to get to cloudbase at the towers around 1600m.  Originally I had thought about going to Banjo, but Alex suggested the west wind would make getting back from there difficult so we crossed over to Sasquatch with Vlad.

The wind wasn't so bad at Sasquatch but it was definitely there and increasing the further west we flew.  Alex and Vlad were a thermal ahead of me after I missed a climb they had gotten earlier, and they were reporting quite windy and trashy conditions at Big Nic, and in fact had turned around on the way to Dewdney.  So I decided to turn around at Big Nic and return to Woodside, and once back there the west wind had disappeared, and I could just see it barely starting up on Harrison Bay.

Crossing back to Woodside from Sasquatch at 1800m.  High cloudbase!

Since there was still lots of daytime left and the car was now over at Bridal Falls Alex and I flew over to the Bridal side along with Peter Spear, who had already done a Woodside-Bridal-Woodside flight, and was on lap #2 (!).  The Fraser River was still quite high and no landings on the Bridal side except for the powerline triangle, but we arrived with plenty of height and the flying conditions were *much* nice on the Bridal side!

Cloudbase was around 1900-2000m and pilots were all over the place at Cheam, the Lakes, Archibald, Upper Bridal, and Gloria.  There was practically no wind (the west wind hadn't yet arrived on the Bridal side) and at times my GPS actually said it was light east or north wind aloft!  It was quite the change from the Woodside side and it was nice to relax a bit and cruise the ridge at Bridal and not have to worry about recrossing back to Woodside.  I think many pilots did do the crossing, although I also heard some pilots landed at Seabird Island after getting too low to make the crossing to Bridal with any comfort.

Over on the Bridal side where the flying was much cruisier!

The west wind never really got to Woodside or Bridal and it would have probably been a good day to try flying to Hope and return!

68 km FAI triangle.