Dalhart or Bust!!

Four of us from the Fault Line Flyers (FLF) Soaring Club in Austin, Texas are making the pilgrimage up to the the High Plains of the Texas Panhandle to participate in what has become an annual tradition for the Soaring Society of Boulder (since 1985!)…the annual Cross Country Camp at Dalhart, Texas. The friendly folks from Colorado have welcomed us to share their camp with open arms and we are looking forward to a week of great flying and great camaraderie with our new friends from Boulder!

Why Dalhart? Excellent soaring conditions prevail at this time of year, and the benign surroundings for landouts as well as the low amount of traffic make this a perfect environment for novice XC pilots looking to stretch their boundaries. That describes me to a tee. The potential for Silver and even perhaps a Gold Badge flight tempts me greatly, as well as the unique opportunity to do an SSB tradition, the “5-stater” flight…a start from Texas, with turnpoints in New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas and Oklahoma ending up back in Dalhart! Plenty of willing (and hungry!) hands willing to retrieve for a free meal reduce the fear of pushing the boundaries like one sometimes experiences when flying out of the local club, so that’s one less thing to worry about…and Dalhart is not exactly a high cost of living area if one ends up being a frequent dinner-provider!

Last year’s progress through the ABC and Bronze Badges only whetted my appetite for going farther away from the airport. This year’s progress has been enhanced by attending Caesar Creek Soaring Club’s excellent XC camp last month. Now it’s time to put those new skills to work on my own!

Journeying with me up to Dalhart is fellow CCSC attendee Lane Coleman with his ASW-20 (4Q) and fellow FLF’ers  Dave Kammeyer in his DG-303 (XLT) and Morris Carter in his beautiful SGS 1-35.  As for me I’ll be flying my wonderful old ASW-19b (ZAP).

Today has been non-stop busy getting ready for the trip and making sure everything is either in the trailer or the Suburban tow vehicle…thank goodness DHT Kamp Kommandant Joe Brack sent out a checklist of what to pack a few days ago!

Tomorrow, it’s an early departure with approximately 9-10 hours of drive time ahead of me…all in one state! The plan is to hopefully get there early enough to be able to assemble, help others do the same and then get some rest before the camp’s official start Friday.

Off to get some rest before the long drive…I will try to send some updates of the camp as the week progresses, and will hopefully report by week’s end on the accomplishments of this year’s group!

Rob Schroer

ZAP

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