I saw the vents, far below.

Transcription

1 Wednesday, June 15, 2016 Cobra flight #544, PIC #557, 3 landings Rio Puerco, Vents, Jemez Caldera, Chama Canyon, Jicarilla, Pagosa Springs, Weiminuche Pass, Creede Belen: 5:42am Jicarilla: 8:46am Jicarilla: 9:03am Creede: 10:42am Airtime: 4.7 hrs Total PIC Time: Total Logged Time: The wife and baby of my trike flying friend Chris is taking a trip to visit her family, so Chris organized a week long flying and camping trip in Colorado in honor of their absence. Paul and I are heading up to Creede this morning to meet up with 3 trikes and pilots from Taos, plus 2 whitewater kayaking buddies of Chris. Today, we will fly due north and cross the high mountains north of Pagosa Springs to reach the Creede Valley. I want to clear the mountains as early in the day as possible. Civil twilight starts at 5:20 am today. So Paul and I left from Albuquerque at 3:15 am. We were in the air just before sunrise.

2 We flew up the Puerco and stayed on the east side of Prieta Mesa. As I approached the vent area, I saw a strange slot like formation in the Puerco stream bed. I ll have to come back and check it out again someday. I started climbing here. We needed to gain some altitude to overfly the Jemez Caldera. I saw the vents, far below.

3 The view over the desert to the south. Paul s trike is dead center, a mile back.

4 We climbed up high and flew along side Jemez Canyon to the East.

5 Approaching the Jemez Caldara with the sun in our eyes we made it to the first of a series of meadows that could serve as emergency landing areas.

6 Over the center of the Valle Grande, looking north towards Valle San Antonio.

7 We exited the Valle Grande National Monument, and dropped down low over the Valle de Grulla, which has a very smooth, boulder lined road passing through the center. The road looked better this year than ever before. Definite landing possibilities here.

8 We continued on past the edge of the mesa. To the left I saw the Galina Valley where I had flown about a month ago to reach Murrow field (NM99). We angled to the right to reach the Chama River Canyon.

9 We had some moderate winds across our path, enough to encourage me to fly high over the entrance to the Chama River Canyon. I looked down and found the white school bus sized rock, with a precarious grip on the sandstone I had noticed a couple years ago (09/09/2012). It is still hanging in there. school bus sized rock

10 Looking south and downstream along Chama River Canyon. We angled our path to the west and landed at Jicarilla Airport to check our fuel situation and make a pitstop before crossing over the high mountains to Creede.

11 Here is my GPS track of the middle portion of the flight. Jicarilla Abiquiu Lake Valle de Grulla Chama Canyon Jemez Caldera

12 We flew north from Jicarilla, and started climbing just north of Pagosa Springs Airport. Down in the valley, I saw the smoke from a fire rise in a perfect white ribbon from the ground. We had made good time and it was still before 10am. But as I climbed I could feel the winds growing stronger out of the south. At least we would have a tail wind for the crossing. This is Williams Lake on the right and the Weimenuche Valley on the left, at the base of the mountains that separated us from Creede.

13 At this point I had climbed to the altitude of Weimenuche Pass (10,630 ft). The winds were at least 20 mph and we had not yet cleared the tops of the mountain. I felt the pass would be a trap, funneling the winds between the peaks. I decided to climb high enough to clear the tops of the mountains. We followed Weimenuche Valley on the left side, which ends at the base of 12, 967ft Mt Hossick.

14 Paul and I circled at the head of the Weimenuche Valley, finally reaching an altitude of 13,000 ft. The only mountain higher than was the Rio Grande Pyramid, rising above the horizon just left of the center of the image above. I turned downwind and stayed high, reaching a maximum ground speed of 103 mph. The airspeed of my trike was probably around 65 mph.

15 High above Weimenuche Pass Although the air was not too rowdy, I kept my hands firmly gripped to the control bar until we passed over Rio Grande Reservoir which is out of sight, at the end of the valley in the picture above. At that time Paul radioed, Jeff, are you still on this frequency? I laughed out loud inside my helmet. I realized that I had not made a transmission or taken a photo in a long time. This is the last frame of video from my GoPro before the battery ran out. Far below, I could see waves on the surface of Rio Grande Reservoir. We stayed high until we were made it to the main part of the Creede valley, adjacent to Santa Maria Reservoir.

16 I was doing 90mph down the valley to Creede and was relived to see the dead calm airport windsock. I wasted no time and landed before the winds could travel down the canyon. With a great feeling of relief, I pushed my trike under the hangar door. We had landed about a half hour after our friends from Taos. They had made it to Creede about 90 minutes ago, then went on a scenic tour of the valley before the winds chased down the valley and to the safely of the hangar. About 20 minutes after we had landed, 15 mph surface winds made it to the airport. Here is the GPS track of the end of the flight. Santa Maria Reservoir Creede Airport Rio Grande Reservoir Mt Hossick Weimenuche Pass Williams Lake Spiral Climb to ft.

17 What a day, what a flight!!! Later that day, Paul and I shuttled the whitewater guys to the put in just below Rio Grande Reservoir and left a vehicle at the at the takeout point. One of the whitewater guys (Steve) fell in and got really cold, but his buddies saved him and brought him back to the hangar. Here is my GPS track of the entire flight from Belen to Creede. Creede Mt Hossick Chama Canyon Abiquiu Lake Valle de Grulla Jicarilla Jemez Caldera Belen