Woodside Flying, August 28/29

An excellent Woodside weekend! Nice flying but no pictures – must remember to get the camera out again. Saturday we had nice lift at Woodside launch, some cloud surfing, followed by my first Woodside cross country with Pete and Andrew. Got enough height over launch but on the way east along the ridge between Mt Woodside and Agassiz Mt nothing but sink, and I was sinking a lot more than Pete cause I was hesitant to step on the bar (when on glide the speedbar is your friend!). I couldn’t remember how high the sealing was above Kent Prison (no landing there!) and almost turned back, but with Pete’s encouragement I made it to Agassiz Mt and climbed up to the level of the sub peak and almost to where Pete was. Unfortunately the north wind blew apart all thermals above peak elevation and we couldn’t climb any higher. Didn’t want to fight the wind coming out of the Harrison gap and went southeast where it had space to fan out and mellow out, landing in a nice big field in Agassiz. When we packed up a fellow from across the street came over and asked many questions – he had often seen wings in the air at Woodside and now took advantage to find out more about flying them.

Sunday saw us back at Woodside, with the first flight ridge soaring just above launch. The second flight was even better. Winds were stronger (not student-friendly anymore), but nice launches for all of us. After half an hour soaring north of launch with Gab on tandem and Pete we went over to the south knoll. We saw an eagle sky-rocket up in a thermal and in seconds later 4 fabric wings congregated below the eagle and got on his elevator in the sky. Never had that much lift over the knoll before! Lots more thermaling before we landed at Harvest Market.

Taku, July 28 - Aug 13

The red line is the Taku and our route from the Nahlin/Sheslay confluence down the Inklin and Taku to Taku Inlet. The blue line is the Tuya River north of Dease Lake. We paddled it in 2003, our first self-supported multi-day into the 'unknown'.

Thormanby Islands, Aug 14-15

The weekend forecast was for crazy hot temperatures. We decided this would only be tolerable close to the water, so we loaded the sea kayaks on the car and set off for the Sunshine Coast. The objective was the Thormanby Islands. We launched at a small Marina in Secret Cove. With many stops to cool down in the ocean we found a camp spot in our own private cove on the south side of South Thormanby (a provincial park). On Sunday we completed our circumnavigation of both South and North Thormanby (somewhat unavoidable as the two islands are actually connected by a sandbar in all but the highest flood).



After 2 weeks on the silty Taku I was thoroughly impressed by the crystal clear ocean water. Along the southern half of our route we encountered many seals (most of them moms with babies) and only few humans. This changed as soon as we passed Buccaneer Bay, a place Pete remembered from his childhood sailboat trips. Lots of sailboats anchored and people enjoying the beach when we came by.



It was hot even on the water, but whenever we got to a nice cove or sandy beach we stopped for dips in the ocean to cool down. Great to get out in the sea kayaks and escape the heat.