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Friday, 10/29/04 Friday’s flight to Fillmore has to be in my top 10 XC fun list. Ron Meyer and I stuck together for almost the entire 44 miles. I get more out of flying with friends as apposed to against in them competition. The long flight from Pine last September with Ron Faoro will always be near the top of the fun XC list. The flight started out fairly easy. Every peak and spine from launch to Ramero seemed to be going off. When the lift became a little spotty at Castle Ridge I pressed on hoping for that next thermal. Pressing on wasn’t working out as planned and I flushed off CR twice. Meyer showed more patience searching and waiting for the cycles as he toured the range. He hung out and waited as I wiggled my way back up the ridge. Dean and Ron Faoro caught up and it looked like the four of us would go through the Pass together. I figured our odds of all of us making it through to White Ledge were better if we worked as a team. Sticking together is much tougher than it sounds. As Brendan describes it, “it’s like herding cats”. While Ron Faoro was stuck at the power lines, Ron Meyer bolted for Noon peak. Dean and I followed Meyer to West Divide. The team was down to three. Dean zigged while Meyer and I zagged on West divide. We watched as Dean slipped and clawed his way down East Divide to a nice LZ on Chismahoo road. The team was now down to two. As Meyer and I rounded White Ledge we heard Faoro was in still in the game and SD/Sharon were closing in. I’m not sure how it happened, but by the time I climbed out at the Nuthouse I was a couple of miles ahead of Meyer. Screw him, the teams down to one :) SD/Sharon, Meyer and I made easy work of Ojai topping out above 6k at all the stops. The 3 of us joined back up at Santa Paula ridge, Fillmore was just a glide away. Diablo was in the lead with his Atos and reported a strong head wind just east of Fillmore. The air was super buoyant over the LZ next to Vons. I hung out waiting on Meyer so we could land together. We all met up at OJ's house for story telling. Thanks to Susan for feeding us (and staying awake while we bragged about our flights).
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