what a fine day in the northwest for flying fighters.
saturday...september 23...sunny, 70 degrees, winds 4-6k north off the shining waters of puget sound...the ferry rides to whidby island and back were great cherries to top off one very amazing day.
with nfka's stalwart manjha-gang over in taipei taking care of the chinese, some of us decided to take up an invitation to fly together one more time in september. besides, bruce had built two more large kites we wanted to test....an indian and another buka...what a grin!
i'll let bruce disclose the design specifications, but chuck and i tested those puppies pretty good...we honked them around the sky, did 360's, flew unders and overs on 80 feet of line, and generally had fun pushing their limits in the prevailing wind. their flight characteristics are just like the smaller versions...indian does indian stuff and buka does buka stuff...only slower and more powerfully. we are both impressed with their potential for shortline elephant wars...just like roks, but with complete fighter maneuverability. it's really cool to straight-track a 4 foot buka all the way across the window six inches off the ground...woooooweeee!
ft. casey is on whidby island in the north puget sound area of washington state, usa...the festival is smaller than many, but it is perfectly sized and run for maximum enjoyment...beautiful old parade grounds right on the shoreline...thanks to alan taylor for inviting nfka and to brian for setting us up, then leaving to serve as designated driver for our world cup team...
the festival hosts were great to us. absolutely nice people with a fine festival. we learned that we didn't have a flying field available until noon...but, once explained, we agreed that the festival was better served using the field in the morning to teach people how to fly...even though they only wanted to teach stunt kites, not fighters...pope tom whined a bit, so we burped him and laid him down to take a nap while the rest of us hung around and got zoned out in the sunshine.
we got our flying field right on time at noon and
proceeded to fly our little bunnies off...breaking
only for a 15 minute "field A" demonstration of
the big and little kites...pope tom was a perfect
blow-by-blow announcer. needless to say, the
crowd was seriously underwhelmed, but it was fun
and we happily skipped back to our own little
piece of real estate and proceeded to have an
absolutely barnstorming round-robin competition.
what was really fun was that every one of the new kids took points this time. rabid backseat driving was commonplace as the more experienced flyers shouted encouragement, giving urgent directions and cheering on the underdog of each match...heidi flew one of the pope's hornets with real authority...art was a two tiger even without the beer...
this was so cool...steve m even got off his buggy to fly fighters with us...
no one left the field without feeling the thrill of victory and that's what it's all about. a couple of nfka flyers have been flying for less than a year and suddenly, since wiskf, have become true competitors...we couldn't have been a happier bunch...especially when art took a point from me and got chuck so happy that he was actually jumping up and down and shouting with glee...i've never seen him so animated...thought he might be epileptic...or overdosed on bad tequila...but no, he was just truly happy at the sight of me getting trounced by art...the rest of the peanut gallery cheered and applauded wildly.
...poop on all of them...anyone else want a piece of me?
when we had completed the round robin, chuck and i were tied with 19 points apiece...we flew a best of 5...indian vs. buka just as it should be.
round robin result:
so, one heck of a day was had...thanks to all...
grins are still pasted to my ears..
d.