Where to live with soaring in mind?

On Feb 14, 2:57*pm, "Fred Blair"
wrote:
OK Tim, where do you live, it sounds great?"Tim Taylor" wrote in message

Sorry Fred, was trying to keep it a secret (at least until Region 9
North this summer).

Logan, Utah home of Utah State University in Northern Utah about 80
miles north of Salt Lake City.

You can view the area and turnpoints on the WW TP Exchange by clicking
on the google maps link or the Google Earth link. The turnpoints were
just posted this week.

Logan is consistently on the safest small cities list (http://
http://www.articlesbase.com/real-est...es-84379.html).

Also best place to retire young (http://finance.yahoo.com/retirement/
article/102845/best-places-to-retire-young&.pf=retirement).

Great small town with SLC only an hour and a half away if you really
need to visit something bigger.

Search this group for "Ridge Running in Northern Utah" and you can
see the ridge potential. We don't bother to rig if you can't do 300K,
a good day is 500K and I expect to see a 1000K out of Logan in the
next two years. You can seach OLC for Logan and see many flights over
the last few years.

The airport is a former WWII base similar to Minden with three runways
(two active). Mountains are less than four miles from the airport,
yet many good fields to land in if needed. This summers contest will
be about a week after the peak of the season, but it should still be
very good. The conditions peak about the last week of July to first
week of August. We are north of the monsoon line so don't usually get
the OD of southern UT and Arizona.

Tim Taylor wrote:
On Feb 14, 2:57 pm, "Fred Blair"
wrote:
OK Tim, where do you live, it sounds great?"Tim Taylor" wrote in message

Sorry Fred, was trying to keep it a secret (at least until Region 9
North this summer).

Logan, Utah home of Utah State University in Northern Utah about 80
miles north of Salt Lake City.

You can view the area and turnpoints on the WW TP Exchange by clicking
on the google maps link or the Google Earth link. The turnpoints were
just posted this week.

Logan is consistently on the safest small cities list (http://
http://www.articlesbase.com/real-est...es-84379.html).

Also best place to retire young (http://finance.yahoo.com/retirement/
article/102845/best-places-to-retire-young&.pf=retirement).

Great small town with SLC only an hour and a half away if you really
need to visit something bigger.

Search this group for "Ridge Running in Northern Utah" and you can
see the ridge potential. We don't bother to rig if you can't do 300K,
a good day is 500K and I expect to see a 1000K out of Logan in the
next two years. You can seach OLC for Logan and see many flights over
the last few years.

The airport is a former WWII base similar to Minden with three runways
(two active). Mountains are less than four miles from the airport,
yet many good fields to land in if needed. This summers contest will
be about a week after the peak of the season, but it should still be
very good. The conditions peak about the last week of July to first
week of August. We are north of the monsoon line so don't usually get
the OD of southern UT and Arizona.


Is the soaring as good as Parowan?

On Feb 14, 5:06*pm, Greg Arnold wrote:

Is the soaring as good as Parowan?

Greg,

Yes and no. If you are asking are the thermals as strong, Logan tends
to average 6 to 10 knot thermals, from my experience Parowan during
the peak of the year is about 8 to 12 knots. Logan has better ridge
sections, about 300 miles total over several ranges. Parowan has some
ridges that work, but not in sections that can be used exclusively as
ridge. Logan is also easier to utilize wave with the Wasatch Front
generating consistent wave from fall to spring.

Each site has positives and negatives and slightly different season.
Parowan tends to go into monsoon conditions in July and can be very
volatile. Logan is usually just north of the monsoon line and gets
fewer of the OD days. Both are in the great-basin so are strong
soaring sites and should never be taken for granted by any pilot. I
have landed in 40 knot blowout of storms at Logan as well as Parowan.

From a safety standpoint Logan has more landable areas and the airport
is much safer than Parowan. Anyone who has come home to a
thunderstorm at Parowan worries about a strong crosswind with no
option but the fields or dry lake bed west of town. All three of
Logan's runways are landable and the main runway is 9000 feet long.
Logan is also 1500 feet lower at 4500 feet msl.

I like both sites, each has great soaring compared to almost anyplace
in the world. For crews I think they will find Logan to one of the
nicest soaring towns of anyplace we have contests. There are not too
many soaring sites you go to live plays and opera in the evening and
spend your days hiking in national forest only 10 minutes away.

At 00:45 15 February 2009, Tim Taylor wrote:
Anyone who has come home to a
thunderstorm at Parowan worries about a strong crosswind with no
option but the fields or dry lake bed west of town.

About three years ago I walked that lake bed. It is big, flat, hard -
just llike a natural airfield, and with easy access to the road.

A few days later I chose to land there because of a blowout at Parowan and
an imminent thunderstorm bearing down from the north. My crew [ the glider
owner, bless his tolerant heart] was on the way before I landed. Landing
was just fine, and the first little plop of rain hit the windshield as I
unstrapped. Two minutes later it was a downpour. When retrieve arrived
[maybe ten minutes at the very most] we considered it best to leave the
trailer by the road and haul the glider to the lake edge for disassembly.


That dry hard surface turns to a gluey quicksand as soon as it is wet. By
the time we reached the edge of the lake I was walking wing on 6-inch
stilts of mud, the tow SUV was up above the hubs in mud, and the 1-26 was
skidding along because the wheel well was completely filled with mud.

We retrieved and washed off the worst. Next morning, that mud had dried
back to the smooth, flat, hard stuff again - it took a careful chisel to
remove some of it.

Then when we were done the FBO told us that the previous year a Cessna had
spent months stuck in the lake bed waiting for the next thunderstorm to
liquefy the surface again before it could be rescued.

Be warned. Not all lake beds are created equal.

Ian

Tim,

I have always been interested in Utah but have not been able to really assess what it's like there with a family if you are not an LDS member. I have heard that it can be socially limiting, a bit stifling. I was wondering if you could comment on this.

On Feb 14, 8:50*pm, tienshanman tienshanman.
wrote:
Tim,

I have always been interested in Utah but have not been able to really
assess what it's like there with a family if you are not an LDS member.
I have heard that it can be socially limiting, a bit stifling. I was
wondering if you could comment on this.

--
tienshanman

possible that is so in the smaller towns, SLC is 50% non LDS.
Although as a non-member they would really put the rush on you
socially if you evidenced any interest at all.

I lived in Salt Lake City for six years. It's a delightful town with
lots of cultural activities. We found life a bit polarized, as is
generally reported. Members of the LDS church have such busy lives
associated with church activities that we found few mutual social
opportunities. Non-members typically do their own things. This is
also true of older schoolchildren.

Having said this, we made more friends in Salt Lake than we have in
any other city in the USA. We enjoyed the close proximity of outdoor
activities (skiing and hiking) and the soaring is not too shabby.

Be aware that winters can be cold and drawn out and mid-winter
inversions can produce a dreadful unhealthy smog over the entire
valley.

The liquor laws used to be extremely interesting (or stupid, depending
on your perspective), but have improved since the winter Olympics.

Mike

How about Ridgecrest/Inyokern California? Flying is possible year
round and IYK is only 15 minutes from Ridgecrest. The climate is hot
in the summer but it makes for some great soaring. The challenge is
that the only real employer is the naval base at China Lake. Of
course there are jobs with the local banks and school district but
everything is this town revolves around the Navy.

On Feb 16, 12:33*am, "
wrote:
On Feb 14, 8:50*pm, tienshanman tienshanman.

wrote:
Tim,

I have always been interested in Utah but have not been able to really
assess what it's like there with a family if you are not an LDS member.
I have heard that it can be socially limiting, a bit stifling. I was
wondering if you could comment on this.

--
tienshanman

possible that is so in the smaller towns, SLC is 50% non LDS.
Although as a non-member they would really put the rush on you
socially if you evidenced any interest at all.

How about Aqua Dulce in the Santa Clarita Valley, about one hour north
of Los Angeles. Great local airport. One hour drive north to
Tehachapi and Calif. City and even close to Pearblossom, from which
originate some of the longest flights in the country (world).--Dennis

Here's a summary of OLC winter flights 11/1/2008-2/14/2009, for what
it's worth:
Seminole Lake, FL 50
Warner Springs, CA 37
Moriarty, Albuquerque, NM 28
TSA, Dallas, TX 28
El Tiro, Tucson, AZ 26
Williams, CA 18
Chilhowee, TN 18
Grass Roots, Saratoga, FL 18
Hemet-Ryan, CA 17
Marion Co-Brown, GA? 11
Hollister, CA 11
Santa Ynez, 10
Byron, CA 8
Soar Club Huston, TX 8
Pierson, FL 6
FLF 4
Jean - Las Vegas, NV 2
Estrella, AZ 2
Mountain Valley, CA 1
Aqua Duice, 1
Pleasant Valley, Turf, AZ 1
Minden, NV 1
Air Sailing, 1