Guys thank you so much for all your kind answers.
It made me feeling even more excited to fly there with such a friendly
gliding collegues group.
It sounds like it will be a lot of fun !
3.000 to 5.000 meters high flights are really unusual here .
Outlandings are possible but it is better to know where to go land,
using the many data bases we did put together during the many years
and competitions. The good think is that many times, when you land
out, you'll become "an hero arriving from the moon" for the farmer's
family that will bring you to their home and feed you with a lot of
specialties and good wine to taste .. that will make you very
unusefull when your friends will arrive to pick up you and your
glider ...
If any of you need assistance in Italy please let me know
Hope to met you around flying out there next year !
Ciao
Maurizio




On Aug 31, 4:59*pm, jb92563 wrote:
On Aug 30, 1:05*am, Maurizio Cocchi wrote:

Hi everybody, I am from Italy and will come to fly in California area
next year. I am following with great interest the wonderfull flights
from Crystal Ca / Mountain Valley all the way to the north basically
following HWY 395 . Where can I find a complete data base of
outlandings for that area ( see you and Zander ) ? How are
outlandings ? Do you guys usually go by airports ? Are there many
fields for landings outside airports? And what about the retrieve ?
Thanks - Maurizio

I just did some flight planning for my trip up the Owens to Minden.

Granted I flew my motorglider, Grob 109, but it was reassuring to know
that I was never more than 30 miles from an airport, either to the
next one ahead or back to one I just passed.

The terrain seems landable everywhere south of Bishop, being rather
desert like but once passed Bishop the terrain is treed
up till a bit north of Mono Lake.

Even in the treed areas there seemed to be options at the side of the
395 Highway and the odd clearing hear and there.

Interestingly, the best lift on my trip took place over the treed
areas, and pegged my vario a few times.

It took only a handfull of cicles to gain 1,000' *in those monster
thermals.