See the pics

See the video

Comstock Trip
Amistad National Recreation Area, TX
6/11/2005
By: Beery Miller

What do goats, snakes, scorpions, tarantulas, jack-rabbits, bats,
rock art, canyons, and the Peso River have in common? Well, we
encountered all during our TXWingNut PPG trip to Amistad National
Recreation Area this past weekend in support of Chris Page for the
movie he is producing.

Chris Page organized a trip for fellow TX WingNuts to a site west of Del Rio,
TX well known for where the Pecos River joins the Rio Grande along the Texas
and Mexico border. Chris was shooting video footage for his movie, Into-The-Wind,
on a historic site with canyons and the western natural terrain people recognize for Texas.

Dale Catching, David Walker (+ girlfriend Jeanette and his 2
daughters), Beery Miller, and Hector Herrera were on hand to film or
fly as needed for the movie. The area was scouted Friday evening for
appropriate launching and landing sites for the southeast winds that
were predicted. This site was going to impose a number of new
obstacles not typical of the Houston powered paragliding scene.

First, there was a one-quarter mile wide canyon approximately 300
feet deep with winds blowing anywhere from 4 mph to over 20 mph over
the top. Add to that, the wind from the canyon below was creating
multi-directional vortices as the wind and wind gusts bounced around
the canyon walls. One could look at the water and see the wind going
in a 360° pattern. One definitely did not want to go down into the
canyon as we all imagined huge sink taking place and there was
definitely no landing zone as the water level was the highest it's
been in years.

Second, the terrain was a new obstacle. This part of the country,
there was almost nothing in the wild that wasn't either poisonous or
would impart serious injury with the prickly pear cactus and other
thorn bushes filling the landscape.

Finally, the wind itself was new as we were no longer flying the
laminar wind coming off the gulf. Time selection was going to be
critical to maintain safety margins with the thermals and other wind
gradients.

Did you remember me saying things were poisonous? Well, when David
Walker checked into his motel room, he had to remove two scorpions
from his daughter's room to start out the trip.

Saturday morning, we woke at 4:30 am, showered, and had breakfast
before departing the motel about 5:45 am. When we arrived at the
site 30 minutes later, we pulled into the park area to assess the
wind. The wind was bouncing around at the top of the canyon anywhere
from 12 mph up to about 19 mph. A few thousand feet higher, it
looked like the wind was 25+ mph.

We hung around for several hours giving Chris an opportunity to shoot
some video from land. Chris tried kiting in those stiff winds, and I
got the pleasure of being the anchor that held him to the ground and
it took everything I had to keep from being pulled around.

Eventually, the Park Ranger, Matt Roberson, showed up that Chris had
communicated with earlier in the week. Chris had sought to obtain a
permit to fly underneath the main bridge, but was denied following an
incident where some Piper airplane pilots following 9/11 had raised the
attention of the FAA some months earlier. Those pilots we later
learned lost their pilot licenses plus were fined very heavy for
flying underneath the bridge. Matt, the park ranger, made sure we
knew he hoped he didn't have to make this an expensive weekend for
anyone.

As the winds in the morning never got low, we were out of luck for a
morning flight. As Dale and I returned back to the motel going up
the 2 lane highway with a speed limit of 70 mph, but drivers doing
anywhere from 85 to 95 mph, we saw a slithering object crossing the
road. Thump, we rolled it. Dale thought it was a rattlesnake and
was anticipating dinner. We backed up, anticipating it to be a
rattler, but no rattle. It was obviously poisonous and coiled up for
a strike, but he wasn't going anywhere. We took a number of photos
and headed on back to the motel.

Since late morning and afternoon thermal activity was high, we
decided to travel to Ciudad Acuna crossing into Mexico by foot. As
soon as we crossed the border, a taxi cab driver by the name of Jerry
offered to drive us across the Rio Grande and a few blocks into town
for $5. We took the taxi, and found ourselves in the middle of the
tourist district. Some brandy was bought along with a lunch and some
beer for $1/bottle. Some folks haggled on some items, and made some
good deals, however I wasn't as fortunate and walked away from an
iron wood sculpture. We closed our afternoon with a round of beef
fajitas. We were careful, and nobody encountered Montezuma's Revenge.

After we returned to our hotel, several of us took a nap prior to the
evening adventures. David Walker, our Mr. Realist, did not think the
winds were going to be low enough. I'll have to admit I was in the
same camp as David, but since we had put off the trip a week because
of my wife's birthday, I was committed to going. Knowing that if we
didn't make the 30 mile drive from the motel to the site, we knew for
sure we weren't going to fly. Chris convinced us to go, less Mr.
Realist.

The sun sets around 8:40 pm. As we watched the wind jump from 12 to
15 mph, Chris was a real optimist thinking it would die down. He
wanted video footage really bad. He set his motor up.

Dale meanwhile, had received via Postal Service earlier Saturday
morning at the motel, a diaphragm for his WB-37 carburetor. He's
been having problems and thought he had identified the culprit. As
he warmed his motor up, he discovers that the extra $30 for the
shipping charges were wasted as that wasn't the culprit for the $7
part.

By 8pm, the winds were still strong, but showing signs of becoming
lighter. At 8:15pm, it looks like there may be a real chance. I
make the decision to pull my motor out, reconnect the frame, and fuel
it up. If our wind dummy, Chris Page, gets off the ground and finds
the air stable, I was going to follow up behind him.

As Chris gets setup and starts to launch alongside the road downwind
of the canyon, he kites his wing. Chris, the guy carrying the video
camera, got the Velcro on his helmet stuck in his netting right
before he could turn around and launch after kiting. He had to drop
his wing, and ask for assistance to get his helmet/head out of the
netting. His eventual launch was a little squirrelly with the
equipment, but he was off and no problems with the wind. I then
stretch out my wing, and a couple minutes later was up and off.
Beautiful air!!!! And smooth, but low penetration speed.

During our flight, Chris was blessed with a number of bats that had
exited one of the caves below us and was grabbing bugs off his
wingtips as he flew through the air. We flew up to the canyon while
Dale and Hector filmed us from below before turning up the canyon and
flying up to a railroad bridge. I opted for some greater altitude
limiting Chris to some wide angle video footage as I did not want to
take any chance of landing among all the cacti or other thorny bushes.
We finally turned downwind to make a crossing back to the road, and it
seems in a matter of minutes, we had crossed almost 5 miles of
landscape. Another two minutes, and we could have shot another
couple of miles and been in one of the ox-bow's along the border in
Mexico. Only problem though, was there were no roads for 30 or more
miles on the Mexico side of the Rio Grande.

We finally identified an appropriate landing point by the road and
radio to our ground crew, Dale and Hector, where our target was.
Just after we radioed that information, we dropped down over the
horizon and the ground crew lost radio reception.

Chris setup for his approach, and chose a grassier landing. He would
later find out this was not a good choice. Myself, I chose an
approach that put me landing on a gravel road.

We were both coming in about 20 minutes after sunset (we were using
strobes). As Chris was on approach, he spooked up a deer that did
not seem to know which way to go. Chris lands and his wing drops off
to his side. As I land, I am coming in hot and I must have skied 30 or
more feet in the loose rock before stopping and sitting down on my rear.
My wing very gently falls right in front of me to the ground. Not
pretty, but no knee drags either.

A couple minutes later, our ground crew shows up and I begin
immediately packing my wing and motor. A few minutes later, Chris
hollers out. As he had landed in the grass and was shooting some
extra video, he was slower on packing his wing up. When he did, a
tarantula went running across his lines. Needless to say, he was
excited. We all took photographs, etc. of the tarantula. For most
of us, it was our first time seeing one.

We packed up, and left. The next morning, we would return to again
check out the launch site for one more opportunity. We met Matt the
park ranger again that informed us he had been keeping a good eye on
us to make sure we didn't do something against the regulations. He
was very pleased what he saw the evening before. As we are down in
the canyon near a boat launch, we discover a number of feral goats
climbing up and down the almost vertical walls. It was very
interesting listening to the mother goats call their babies out of
some of the caves to get their first lessons in wall climbing 101.

As the winds were too strong, we called it a day, packed up, and
finally headed back for the 425 mile trip to Houston.

While I didn't have my camera with me for our flight, I did take a
lot of pictures of the site. The pictures of the site can be found
at: <http://www.txwingnuts.com/PPG/index.htm>.

I shot some video, while not the best, it can be found at:
<http://www.txwingnuts.com/TXWingNutsVideos.htm>.

Enjoy!!! We did!!!!

Beery Miller