Sunday, June 19, 2016 Cobra flight #549, PIC #562, 1 landings East River, Fairview Peak, Saquache Valley, Hooper Buckhorn: 6:55am Hooper: 9:28am Airtime: 2.5 hrs Total PIC Time: 1461.0 Total Logged Time: 1482.2 Chris got up early to check for frost this morning. It was there, so we slept in a little and delayed our takeoff to let the trike wings melt and dry off.
Drying off the wing at Crested Butte.
The forecast was for increasing winds today, so we set aside our plans to cross the high mountains to the east and fly to Leadville. Immediately after the launching, we flew past the home of the family that hosted us with a amazing dinner. Their house was just off the end of the runway and they were waiting for us on the sun deck.
Ron headed directly south to Taos and home, while Chris, Paul and I climbed up and flew over the green valley ringed by snow capped peaks.
From here I could see the East River wrap around Crested Butte Mountain.
While we floated around here in the calm morning air, Paul and I flew past Chris and his super high resolution camera to get some air-to-air shots. Note Chris s trike just above the nose of my trike above. The picture on next page has the opposite view from Chris s side. It s amazing.
We continued East in the general direction of Buena Vista Colorado. Here is a flyby I made of Chris s trike.
Crossing over Paul s trike.
We continued east, passing by two reservoirs. Spring Creek in the picture above and Taylor Park in the next valley. We were started to feel the winds now, so we decided pass on Buena Vista and angle south to Saguache and Hooper, where we would camp for the night.
Off to the side I could see a small building on top of a mountain. I diverted for a closer look. It was the Fairview Peak Lookout Station, which is the highest station in the US. It was built in 1911 and was only occupied for one year because of the frequent and severe lightning strikes.
We crossed the Gunnison River and Continental Divide and descended into the Saguache Valley. Once I was well below the ridgeline and in the wind shadow, I dropped down to a couple hundred feet above the terrain and followed the deeply eroded canyons to the Saquache River.
We followed this tributary stream to where it joins the Saguache River on the other side of the isolated peak ahead.
We followed the meandering Saguache River out to the basin.
Interestingly, the Saguache River flows into an isolated basin with no outlet, although it is hydrologically connected underground to the San Luis Valley and the Rio Grande.
We crossed the Saguache Basin to the Hooper Pool airstrip and parked our trikes in the tie down area. This was a great spot to relax and wind down towards the end of the trip. Great food, beautiful pool. It was baking hot all day. I didn t bother setting up my tent. I would wait till dark to do this which turned out to be a big mistake. I walked out to my trike when the pool closed around 10pm and found a huge swarm of mosquitoes near my trike. I quickly set up the tent, didn t bother with the rain-fly, and crawled in to safety.
Here is my GPS track from the day s flight. Crested Butte Fairview Peak Gunnison River Saguache River Hooper