Logan, Utah Mountain XC Camp Report

[[email protected][_2_]]

Over twenty glider pilots had an amazing week in Logan, Utah mid-August 2019 and the world should know how great Logan is to come fly. Logan is a magical, technical mountain soaring site that allows pilots to fly all over northern Utah and far into both Idaho and Wyoming as well. I figure you won't take one of the organizers' word for it so I hope some of the pilots who came out will also post their experiences here.

Logan is a larger college town with lots to offer outside of just soaring so your spouse isn't stuck in some windy, dust bowl of a Podunk town while you are up playing. The airport is very capable of hosting glider events without our getting in the way of other power traffic. While we do launch a little bit later in the 1pm-2pm range, the lift stays till dark so we can still enjoy 6-7 hour big flights. Another nice thing about Logan is that when an event is not going on, there are still tows available from Kim Hall 6 days per week all season long. Many pilots make it out to Logan on a yearly basis to fly for a week or two during the prime soaring months.

We had some fantastic flights during our camp, great weather, amazing dinners, and we were able to enjoy the mountain soaring safely with not much stress. We hope to do another mountain camp in Logan again in a few years.

Here's a video from my first day flying from Logan during the event - fun stuff: https://youtu.be/c6m9n5jYWCk


Safe flying,
Bruno - B4

[Mike N.]

�

[[email protected]]

Logan is a beautiful place to fly. I had a great time there and i want to come back for another opportunity. Cindy did a great job managing the details and the food was super. The tows went perfectly. Good job Bruno for pulling this together.

I love your videos. Could you do one showing just how to climb up to the main ridge. I would like to see how you use the spurs to climb with winds slightly north or south of west. Please start from 2000-2500 ft above the airport.

[SoaringXCellence]

On Tuesday, September 3, 2019 at 8:49:50 PM UTC-7, wrote:
> Logan is a beautiful place to fly. I had a great time there and i want to come back for another opportunity. Cindy did a great job managing the details and the food was super. The tows went perfectly. Good job Bruno for pulling this together.
>
> I love your videos. Could you do one showing just how to climb up to the main ridge. I would like to see how you use the spurs to climb with winds slightly north or south of west. Please start from 2000-2500 ft above the airport.
Get on OLC and look at some of Tim Taylor's flights earlier this year. I did that in preparation for the event and learned a lot just by reviewing his flights.

I only wish I could have stayed longer this year. I was only able to be there for 4 of the days and had some great flights.

Bruno, shall I post the LOOP?

Mike

[Mike N.]

Logan is awesome! I currently live about 30 miles S.W. of Logan. I looked out the window today towards Logan and just awesome cloud streets today. Well developed CU. Along what we locally call the Wasatch back.
You could soar for miles today. Cannot wait to retire so I can fly on week days instead of just weekends.

[Dan Malone]

On Tuesday, September 3, 2019 at 8:30:56 PM UTC-7, wrote:
> Over twenty glider pilots had an amazing week in Logan, Utah mid-August 2019 and the world should know how great Logan is to come fly. Logan is a magical, technical mountain soaring site that allows pilots to fly all over northern Utah and far into both Idaho and Wyoming as well. I figure you won't take one of the organizers' word for it so I hope some of the pilots who came out will also post their experiences here.
>
> Logan is a larger college town with lots to offer outside of just soaring so your spouse isn't stuck in some windy, dust bowl of a Podunk town while you are up playing. The airport is very capable of hosting glider events without our getting in the way of other power traffic. While we do launch a little bit later in the 1pm-2pm range, the lift stays till dark so we can still enjoy 6-7 hour big flights. Another nice thing about Logan is that when an event is not going on, there are still tows available from Kim Hall 6 days per week all season long. Many pilots make it out to Logan on a yearly basis to fly for a week or two during the prime soaring months.
>
> We had some fantastic flights during our camp, great weather, amazing dinners, and we were able to enjoy the mountain soaring safely with not much stress. We hope to do another mountain camp in Logan again in a few years.
>
> Here's a video from my first day flying from Logan during the event - fun stuff: https://youtu.be/c6m9n5jYWCk
>
>
> Safe flying,
> Bruno - B4

Attended the Logan camp this year and learned a lot about flying close to rocks. It was a good event - not too crowded but met a lot nice pilots and crew. I am very glad I attended. Big thanks to Bruno, Cindy, Ron, and Kim for hosting a nice event.

Dan M - PG

[SoaringXCellence]

Here's a video on B4 doing a loop. It was shot with a Rylo 360 camera.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2cAcOxtPM8

Mike

[[email protected]]

I'm adding a much longer post/impression, with the hope that what I learned will help other people thinking about flying at Logan.

The OLC camp was wonderful, one of the best experiences I've had in soaring (and I've had some great ones!) Everyone there was excellent; and I cannot say enough kind words about how well-run it was. Ron Gleason, Bruno Vassel, Kim & Cindy Hall did a super job. The Halls run one of the best FBOs I've ever seen (I'm a commercial+CFI in power too) ... a pleasure just to see that in this era of declining general aviation.

I will go back! ... and its a long schlepp for me -- drove out from New York bringing my Discus, to fly the Ephrata regionals and the Logan OLC.

I went to Logan cautiously and with a personal agenda -- I never attempted to jump over to the Salt River Range, also never flew with water (the 2nd is likely a prerequisite for the first) ... felt I had my hands full with what I was attempting ... maybe do those things next year.

But I did get my Gold altitude on the first day I had an oxygen system in QJ, and I made a good flight every day I was there (except the one I spent wrestling with installing said system) ... you can see that on OLC, and I made two big flights at the end of the week - the second of which made Gold distance, and should have made Diamond goal, but the claim was denied... for weird problems of start/finish that stemmed from XCsoar/LXNAV S100 problems I still do not understand (and may end up being another post here when I know a bit more). Both of these flights were made on days that "weren't so great" by Logan standards, and the flight where I did get Gold distance was made on a day where Ron & Bruno kept the task to "play on the ridge" over concern about the forecast: a mediocre day at Logan can be as good as a great day at most places, particularly in the east.

If you look at Bruno's videos you'd gain the impression that all there is .... is the ridge and jumping the LONG gap to the Salt River range and going north, but this misses everything that is to the west and northwest of Logan, away from the ridge. There's excellent soaring there on decent days, and its over very landable terrain. It's good country to do your gold or diamond flights.

This being said, most days do start with climbing the Logan ridge to get out of the early valley inversion, and it's not a good place for those with weak pilotage -- A pilot must be competent at low-altitude maneuvering, be able to maneuver by ground reference instinctively at bank angles 45° and more in a wind. But given that, and some common sense ... it's much safer than its reputation.

Logan is DIFFERENT; it upsets much of "what you know" from other places. You need to listen to those with local knowledge, and ridge soaring experience of any kind helps.

I learned to fly at Torrey Pines (that dates me), and instructed there when I was young. That all came back to me and was completely relevant. One of the local pilots dismissed it as "that's a sand dune" and in comparison of scale that's true, but you need greater precision and quicker judgement flying a small ridge, and they can be rougher.

Several things make Logan different though:

* DENSITY ALTITUDE (do not forget it!) Your circling size is larger, both due to altitude and the fact of any ridge flying: roll authority is is key, always keeping your speed up enough so you have it is a necessity.

* It's a very tall ridge, so the thermal wind up it matters much more; this (and the typical low valley inversion) is what makes it truly "alpine." But I don't know of any other "alpine" amidst western desert soaring.

* The scale and the height mean that thermals often cling to ridges coming up the slope, and the gullies are large -- both of these provide impetus to circle more. On weak days, or if you start down in the inversion, you won't be able to climb out just by figure-eighting. Circling close to the ridge takes very good judgement ... every circle. Each time around you must judge whether you are OK early enough to figure-eight out if you are not. The biggest safety "edge" you can easily give yourself at Logan is just to take a higher tow; particularly important if you are flying something extra-long-winged.

* Almost all of the terrain on top of the ridge and to the east is unlandable. Don't get far enough east of the main scarp that you cannot get back! Below the main scarp there's varying jumble, particularly as you go north & south ... but all the canyons do lead out, at safe gradients.

But again ... to the west and north -- lots of safe landable terrain.

If anybody wants to talk to me more about it ... I'm Lee Harrison, QJ

[Dan Marotta]

Excellent report, Lee!Â* And good advice on the type of flying required
to climb the ridge east of Logan.

Next time you get there use water in that Discus.Â* You'll be glad you did.

On 9/5/2019 9:05 PM, wrote:
> I'm adding a much longer post/impression, with the hope that what I learned will help other people thinking about flying at Logan.
>
> The OLC camp was wonderful, one of the best experiences I've had in soaring (and I've had some great ones!) Everyone there was excellent; and I cannot say enough kind words about how well-run it was. Ron Gleason, Bruno Vassel, Kim & Cindy Hall did a super job. The Halls run one of the best FBOs I've ever seen (I'm a commercial+CFI in power too) ... a pleasure just to see that in this era of declining general aviation.
>
> I will go back! ... and its a long schlepp for me -- drove out from New York bringing my Discus, to fly the Ephrata regionals and the Logan OLC.
>
> I went to Logan cautiously and with a personal agenda -- I never attempted to jump over to the Salt River Range, also never flew with water (the 2nd is likely a prerequisite for the first) ... felt I had my hands full with what I was attempting ... maybe do those things next year.
>
> But I did get my Gold altitude on the first day I had an oxygen system in QJ, and I made a good flight every day I was there (except the one I spent wrestling with installing said system) ... you can see that on OLC, and I made two big flights at the end of the week - the second of which made Gold distance, and should have made Diamond goal, but the claim was denied... for weird problems of start/finish that stemmed from XCsoar/LXNAV S100 problems I still do not understand (and may end up being another post here when I know a bit more). Both of these flights were made on days that "weren't so great" by Logan standards, and the flight where I did get Gold distance was made on a day where Ron & Bruno kept the task to "play on the ridge" over concern about the forecast: a mediocre day at Logan can be as good as a great day at most places, particularly in the east.
>
> If you look at Bruno's videos you'd gain the impression that all there is ... is the ridge and jumping the LONG gap to the Salt River range and going north, but this misses everything that is to the west and northwest of Logan, away from the ridge. There's excellent soaring there on decent days, and its over very landable terrain. It's good country to do your gold or diamond flights.
>
> This being said, most days do start with climbing the Logan ridge to get out of the early valley inversion, and it's not a good place for those with weak pilotage -- A pilot must be competent at low-altitude maneuvering, be able to maneuver by ground reference instinctively at bank angles 45° and more in a wind. But given that, and some common sense ... it's much safer than its reputation.
>
> Logan is DIFFERENT; it upsets much of "what you know" from other places. You need to listen to those with local knowledge, and ridge soaring experience of any kind helps.
>
> I learned to fly at Torrey Pines (that dates me), and instructed there when I was young. That all came back to me and was completely relevant. One of the local pilots dismissed it as "that's a sand dune" and in comparison of scale that's true, but you need greater precision and quicker judgement flying a small ridge, and they can be rougher.
>
> Several things make Logan different though:
>
> * DENSITY ALTITUDE (do not forget it!) Your circling size is larger, both due to altitude and the fact of any ridge flying: roll authority is is key, always keeping your speed up enough so you have it is a necessity.
>
> * It's a very tall ridge, so the thermal wind up it matters much more; this (and the typical low valley inversion) is what makes it truly "alpine." But I don't know of any other "alpine" amidst western desert soaring.
>
> * The scale and the height mean that thermals often cling to ridges coming up the slope, and the gullies are large -- both of these provide impetus to circle more. On weak days, or if you start down in the inversion, you won't be able to climb out just by figure-eighting. Circling close to the ridge takes very good judgement ... every circle. Each time around you must judge whether you are OK early enough to figure-eight out if you are not. The biggest safety "edge" you can easily give yourself at Logan is just to take a higher tow; particularly important if you are flying something extra-long-winged.
>
> * Almost all of the terrain on top of the ridge and to the east is unlandable. Don't get far enough east of the main scarp that you cannot get back! Below the main scarp there's varying jumble, particularly as you go north & south ... but all the canyons do lead out, at safe gradients.
>
> But again ... to the west and north -- lots of safe landable terrain.
>
> If anybody wants to talk to me more about it ... I'm Lee Harrison, QJ

--
Dan, 5J

[Ralph Trinity]

GREAT Experience. We drove from Austin Texas and can't wait to do this again.
1) Bruno + Ron + Kim + Cindy and the team did a Great job running an instructive and safe camp. They were constantly coaching and helping keep us safe..

2) The Logan Ridge + 4 other convenient Ridges + Valley lift + The western desert + Wave Lift + multi-sourced Convergence lift makes this soaring site one of the most interesting and educational sites I've ever experienced.

3) I've flown Nephi as well, and both sites have their attractions. Both are great places to fly. For you experienced ridge runners and mountain flyers that have not yet tried logan, Kim will be glad to give you a tow so if you are in the area you might want to give it a try.

4) The ridge lift was great, the convergence lift was great, there was wave that more skilled pilots could have harnessed as well, and the thermals were great as well.

5) Some people find climbing up the ridge at the start of day to be work. Ron and Bruno made some simple changes that make that less taxing. First they launched later in the day when the thermal and wind activity made this easier. Second they permitted people to tow to a height that made the connection easier. Whether you are using the camp or are an experienced pilot getting a tow from Kim, I recommend for the first few days you use both of those techniques.

THANKS AGAIN to RON and BRUNO for continuing this great work with these camps and contests at Nephi and Logan, and for all the videos that are educating and teaching people about soaring and soaring with the appropriate disciplines.

[Dan Thirkill[_2_]]

Logan,

What a delight. The writings of others are spot on. Logan is a challenging environment and one needs to prepare accordingly. But what return for the effort! Magnificent flying.

I want to touch on a major component of the event, the people. The group was small, a bit more on the geriatric side of life (with exceptions ;-) and all were deeply interested in learning. Though I am local and have flown at both Nephi and Logan events multiple times, my preference is Logan. Why? Unlike the competitive edge at most SSA events, at this camp those pressures were conspicuously absent. The camaraderie and mutual involvement of people helping one another succeed was the principal goal. Interaction amongst attendees was superb and enhanced by the small group size. Kim, Cindy, Ron and Bruno superbly organized and directed the event and are to be commended for their effort. I’ll be making plans to return in the future.

Dan Thirkill
PY

[[email protected]]

Hi all ... a few more thoughts:

1. I know from talking to Ron and Bruno that they don't intend to run another (semi)formal camp at Logan ... but possibly we could self-organize a less formal get-together? I'd be willing to coordinate if there's interest .... and will post something up in next year's late winter to see if there's any interest unless somebody else does so. (if anybody else does, let me know)

It's WAAAY more fun, and also safer, to be flying with others there.

2. if there aren't many gliders at Logan you may be able to get tie-down close to the take-off line, but for the OLC we all tied down at the end of an abandoned runway (very good place for safety and quiet) ... you need to have a good functional tow-out bar and wing-wheel. I went west for my summer adventure with a home-brew wing wheel that made me the butt of humor at moments -- it worked and survived just barely well enough to get through the summer ... and 2.0 will get made this winter.

3. You absolutely must have oxygen. A bad story here -- I turned my old steel cylinder over to Praxair at Logan a month before the OLC for hydrostat, they lost it and then tried to flim-flam me that it had failed hydrostat. I demanded a statement of test results from the company that does the hydrostats down in SLC, and after a delay got back a weird document (that I have) stating it had been "destroyed at the request of vendor" (Praxair).

After that, I had to scramble ... and I got help from Mike Bamberg, without which I might have lost more days ... Thanks, Mike!

4. If you come to Logan consider carefully what sailplane you are flying, and how you'll fly it. I brought a Discus: standard class, known for good handling. Watching Bruno (flying a ASW-27) and Sandy Coleman (ASG-29) fly was instructive ... very different styles/practices of climbing the ridge .... for good reason. Seek advice from somebody expert who flies something like yours, there. The more wing you have ... the more cautious you need to be.

Even though I spend a lot of time in the back seat of two-seaters, I would not recommend bringing a two-seater as your first experience at Logan, unless you can fill that other seat with a local expert comfortable in that seat ... even more so with any of the 20+ meter motor-sailplanes.

5. I do want to mention several things I learned from flying there, that apply to flying to the west, particularly making triangles with only one leg on the ridge. These flights are perfectly practical, and flying to the west or north-west will take you over lots of nice landable terrain, with much more typical "western desert" soaring conditions. On good days Gold and Diamond flights are easy, and on really good days I think a shot at FAI speed records is possible.

Aside from the Logan ridge the other "big feature" of the area is that almost always there is a convergence line that runs E-W north of Logan (usually slightly SW - NE) ... very conveniently about where the Logan ridge starts to drop off. It's this convergence that makes the big jump to the Salt River range much more achievable than one might think (more literally makes the idea of getting home much more achievable), and this line also usually goes west.

When this line is working well to the west screaming-fast triangles are possible -- two of the three legs could be flown at near red-line without much turning, cloud bases are high enough that the last leg could be final glide or nearly so.

Thursday and Friday of the OLC I made two attempts to get gold distance and diamond goal, flying triangles to the west, on "not so great" days at Logan ... still much better days than all but the rarest days that we get in the east (and those only happen in a narrow window in spring, before the trees are fully leafed out, after a cold-front comes through).

On both of these days the convergence line to the west was weak, and the buoyancy/shear not great. On the Thursday flight I declared Deep Creek Peak as the west turnpoint. When I turned west onto the visible cloud street I found that it was chopped up into uselessness, and rapidly being pushed south, and I was flying into a stiffer west wind at altitude than I expected. I made three successive southward tries to get onto lines, got out as far west as Malad City on the third try, and abandoned the goal attempt ... but I flew south and took a good look at the southern end of the Logan ridge .... and this did set me up for Friday's try #2.

On Friday the weather forecast was worse, a forecast of high winds aloft, and Ron & Bruno provided a "just play on the ridge" task for the OLC, but I was determined to at least make a try for these badge flights, knowing that realistically it was my last shot this year ... and after talking to Tim Taylor and based on what I had seen I declared Allen-Tigart AP (north of the ridge), Malad City AP, and then Powder Mt (south end of the usable ridge).

This was a flatter triangle, and to make 300 km meant using Powder Mt as the south turn point ... and I want to provide some commentary on this, because this worked ... but there's the issue that the last 15 miles or so south on the ridge to Powder Mt have no landing sites in the valley below.

If you look at my flight (it's up on OLC) you'll see that I went north on the ridge like gangbusters, got high, glided out to Allen-Tigert and then back to a low rampart of the Logan ridge ...

It's a common saying at Logan that "8000 ft here is like 2000 ft anywhere else" ... so true. When the valley inversion is reasonably strong there's no lift down low anywhere EXCEPT on the sun/wind fed faces of even relatively low ridges. This whole flight was actually made possible by three things:

* turning from Allen-Tigert I could get back to the low ramparts/extension of the ridge, and was able to (anxiously) climb out and back up onto it.

* The convergence line west was too sheared up to provide any useful climbs, but it greatly aided the glide west into the wind, making Malad City feasible, but more importantly I could do just about the same thing again, getting to the foothills of Oxford Peak just to the south.

Both of those turnpoint climb-outs were reasonably extreme -- never would have considered them if I had not had the experience of the earlier days.

From there I turned back downwind, getting back onto the main ridge rather than going directly toward Powder Mt ... and I want to emphasize that decision, even though I had Powder Mt easily made from the altitude I had off the Oxford/Gunsight chain.

The reason I went back to the main ridge is that I thought it was critical to go down the ridge to Powder Mt, in order to have a safe flight into that unlandable terrain, and some surety of being able to get back north from Powder Mt., late in the day.

There are lots of ridges that people fly in the USA that dribble off into the unlandable -- I've flown at several, and there's a technique involved .... you fly down carefully exploring how you will get back -- there are complications in this, if anyone wants to talk to me about it I could explain more -- but the key thing is that once you are down on the lower parts of the ridge with unlandable terrain at the foot, the ONLY way back will be to climb on the return, so you need to study the terrain below as you go down, and particularly to study very carefully where sink behind buttresses will be ... and make a judgement to turn back and abandon the goal if you don't like what you see.

These technical judgements are greatly aided by ridge-flying experience anywhere. Without it I would not recommend doing as I did, on that day.

As it turned out I made Powder Mt without trouble and had no real anxieties on the way back north, but it would have been stupid to glide in from the west just assuming that I could get north on the lower ridge down there at the end of the day.

Talking to Tim Taylor, there are good routes that just go north of Allen-Tigert (aka Soda Springs) ... jumping that gap to a chain of peaks ahead. That gap isn't anywhere near as formidable as the jump to the Salt River range ... and those routes offer Gold distance (at least) out-and-returns. In retrospect I probably should have chosen that rather than the flight I declared and made, but I didn't want to take the chance of landing that far away on what was the last day for me ... Annie was flying into SLC the next day and I needed to pack up and go and get her.

[2G]

On Monday, September 9, 2019 at 9:59:31 AM UTC-7, wrote:
> Hi all ... a few more thoughts:
>
> 1. I know from talking to Ron and Bruno that they don't intend to run another (semi)formal camp at Logan ... but possibly we could self-organize a less formal get-together? I'd be willing to coordinate if there's interest .... and will post something up in next year's late winter to see if there's any interest unless somebody else does so. (if anybody else does, let me know)
>
> It's WAAAY more fun, and also safer, to be flying with others there.
>
> 2. if there aren't many gliders at Logan you may be able to get tie-down close to the take-off line, but for the OLC we all tied down at the end of an abandoned runway (very good place for safety and quiet) ... you need to have a good functional tow-out bar and wing-wheel. I went west for my summer adventure with a home-brew wing wheel that made me the butt of humor at moments -- it worked and survived just barely well enough to get through the summer ... and 2.0 will get made this winter.
>
> 3. You absolutely must have oxygen. A bad story here -- I turned my old steel cylinder over to Praxair at Logan a month before the OLC for hydrostat, they lost it and then tried to flim-flam me that it had failed hydrostat. I demanded a statement of test results from the company that does the hydrostats down in SLC, and after a delay got back a weird document (that I have) stating it had been "destroyed at the request of vendor" (Praxair).
>
> After that, I had to scramble ... and I got help from Mike Bamberg, without which I might have lost more days ... Thanks, Mike!
>
> 4. If you come to Logan consider carefully what sailplane you are flying, and how you'll fly it. I brought a Discus: standard class, known for good handling. Watching Bruno (flying a ASW-27) and Sandy Coleman (ASG-29) fly was instructive ... very different styles/practices of climbing the ridge .... for good reason. Seek advice from somebody expert who flies something like yours, there. The more wing you have ... the more cautious you need to be.
>
> Even though I spend a lot of time in the back seat of two-seaters, I would not recommend bringing a two-seater as your first experience at Logan, unless you can fill that other seat with a local expert comfortable in that seat ... even more so with any of the 20+ meter motor-sailplanes.
>
> 5. I do want to mention several things I learned from flying there, that apply to flying to the west, particularly making triangles with only one leg on the ridge. These flights are perfectly practical, and flying to the west or north-west will take you over lots of nice landable terrain, with much more typical "western desert" soaring conditions. On good days Gold and Diamond flights are easy, and on really good days I think a shot at FAI speed records is possible.
>
> Aside from the Logan ridge the other "big feature" of the area is that almost always there is a convergence line that runs E-W north of Logan (usually slightly SW - NE) ... very conveniently about where the Logan ridge starts to drop off. It's this convergence that makes the big jump to the Salt River range much more achievable than one might think (more literally makes the idea of getting home much more achievable), and this line also usually goes west.
>
> When this line is working well to the west screaming-fast triangles are possible -- two of the three legs could be flown at near red-line without much turning, cloud bases are high enough that the last leg could be final glide or nearly so.
>
> Thursday and Friday of the OLC I made two attempts to get gold distance and diamond goal, flying triangles to the west, on "not so great" days at Logan ... still much better days than all but the rarest days that we get in the east (and those only happen in a narrow window in spring, before the trees are fully leafed out, after a cold-front comes through).
>
> On both of these days the convergence line to the west was weak, and the buoyancy/shear not great. On the Thursday flight I declared Deep Creek Peak as the west turnpoint. When I turned west onto the visible cloud street I found that it was chopped up into uselessness, and rapidly being pushed south, and I was flying into a stiffer west wind at altitude than I expected.. I made three successive southward tries to get onto lines, got out as far west as Malad City on the third try, and abandoned the goal attempt ... but I flew south and took a good look at the southern end of the Logan ridge ... and this did set me up for Friday's try #2.
>
> On Friday the weather forecast was worse, a forecast of high winds aloft, and Ron & Bruno provided a "just play on the ridge" task for the OLC, but I was determined to at least make a try for these badge flights, knowing that realistically it was my last shot this year ... and after talking to Tim Taylor and based on what I had seen I declared Allen-Tigart AP (north of the ridge), Malad City AP, and then Powder Mt (south end of the usable ridge).
>
> This was a flatter triangle, and to make 300 km meant using Powder Mt as the south turn point ... and I want to provide some commentary on this, because this worked ... but there's the issue that the last 15 miles or so south on the ridge to Powder Mt have no landing sites in the valley below.
>
> If you look at my flight (it's up on OLC) you'll see that I went north on the ridge like gangbusters, got high, glided out to Allen-Tigert and then back to a low rampart of the Logan ridge ...
>
> It's a common saying at Logan that "8000 ft here is like 2000 ft anywhere else" ... so true. When the valley inversion is reasonably strong there's no lift down low anywhere EXCEPT on the sun/wind fed faces of even relatively low ridges. This whole flight was actually made possible by three things:
>
> * turning from Allen-Tigert I could get back to the low ramparts/extension of the ridge, and was able to (anxiously) climb out and back up onto it.
>
> * The convergence line west was too sheared up to provide any useful climbs, but it greatly aided the glide west into the wind, making Malad City feasible, but more importantly I could do just about the same thing again, getting to the foothills of Oxford Peak just to the south.
>
> Both of those turnpoint climb-outs were reasonably extreme -- never would have considered them if I had not had the experience of the earlier days.
>
> From there I turned back downwind, getting back onto the main ridge rather than going directly toward Powder Mt ... and I want to emphasize that decision, even though I had Powder Mt easily made from the altitude I had off the Oxford/Gunsight chain.
>
> The reason I went back to the main ridge is that I thought it was critical to go down the ridge to Powder Mt, in order to have a safe flight into that unlandable terrain, and some surety of being able to get back north from Powder Mt., late in the day.
>
> There are lots of ridges that people fly in the USA that dribble off into the unlandable -- I've flown at several, and there's a technique involved .... you fly down carefully exploring how you will get back -- there are complications in this, if anyone wants to talk to me about it I could explain more -- but the key thing is that once you are down on the lower parts of the ridge with unlandable terrain at the foot, the ONLY way back will be to climb on the return, so you need to study the terrain below as you go down, and particularly to study very carefully where sink behind buttresses will be ... and make a judgement to turn back and abandon the goal if you don't like what you see.
>
> These technical judgements are greatly aided by ridge-flying experience anywhere. Without it I would not recommend doing as I did, on that day.
>
> As it turned out I made Powder Mt without trouble and had no real anxieties on the way back north, but it would have been stupid to glide in from the west just assuming that I could get north on the lower ridge down there at the end of the day.
>
> Talking to Tim Taylor, there are good routes that just go north of Allen-Tigert (aka Soda Springs) ... jumping that gap to a chain of peaks ahead. That gap isn't anywhere near as formidable as the jump to the Salt River range ... and those routes offer Gold distance (at least) out-and-returns. In retrospect I probably should have chosen that rather than the flight I declared and made, but I didn't want to take the chance of landing that far away on what was the last day for me ... Annie was flying into SLC the next day and I needed to pack up and go and get her.

Your point on O2 is right on - those of us who have been flying out West for years take it for granted, but people coming from the east may be ill prepared. The 12,500 ft limit (forget about the 30 min 14k exception) only puts you 6kft over most valley floors. This may seem huge compared to flying back east, but it isn't (getting below 12k is time to shift gears; below 10k and you are survival mode). Get the proper gear and have it hydrotested (if necessary) BEFORE heading west. Mountain High is, by far, the preferred vendor. And having a backup regulator is a good idea.

Tom