Flying possibilities

[Bill Cummings]

Okay Max,
Here are better directions.
Oops!
Wow! Were my directions confusing or what?
Looks like the destination is not Gray Mountain but really Gray Hill.

From Las Cruces, New Mexico I will be going north on interstate 25 to Socorro New Mexico.

If exit 147 is not still closed I’ll take it and go to business 25 to the middle of Socorro and supply at WalMart. Also meet up with other glide heads.

From southwest Las Cruces to Socorro takes two hours if you drive like my wife. A little longer if you drive like anyone else.

Coming from Albuquerque, (ABQ) New Mexico on Interstate 25 to Socorro NM it takes just under two hours driving like anyone else. You then should take exit 150 to be on business 25.

From the north exit (150) business 25 is also hwy # 60 and California St.
You can take care of your business once on business 25 and also go shopping.

After meeting at WalMart for ice, food, and foolishness we can head south and stay on Hwy # 60 as it goes west toward Magdalena, NM.
Magdalena will afford us a second opportunity should we absentmindedly fail to stock up with sufficient foolishness.

Hwy # 60 if you follow it too far will take you to the Very Large Array if you wish to “Phone Home.” (long distance calls only.)

About 11 miles WSW of Magdalena hwy # 60 will bend it’s elbow and take you WNW.
From the elbow in the road you only go about 0.7 miles and go south on road 168. About two miles on 168 you will want to turn SE toward Gray Hill.
Gray Hill is Lat: 34.037940 Lon: -107.446247
The top of the hill is at 7,677’ msl. The LZ looks to be 400’ lower.
(Training Hill.)
Retrieve fees are: one can of soda or beer.
Camping fees are about half of that.
You must be brave since this site has no USHPA Site Insurance. (Regrettably I’m sure.)

All fees can be waived with a smile.
BLM land. Top and bottom.

[judomax625]

Wow...now those are detailed directions! I'm in! (Sorry about the tiny font but my phone isn't playing nice with the website)

[Bob Kuczewski]

When I saw your post Bill, I was hopeful that it might be a shorter drive from San Diego than going all the way to Las Cruces. I could sure use a break from all the local nonsense.

Unfortunately, it looks a little farther.   

Have fun!!!!

[Bill Cummings]

Max and Bob,
Gray Hill (training hill.) could elicit protestations such as, “I drove all the way for THIS?”
So Bob no one will be bad mouthing you as a “No Show!”

However Max is close enough that we would never let him forget if he was a, “No Show!”

Camping above seven thousand feet msl could have night time temperatures in the 40’s this time of year. I’m expecting day time to be in the 70’s. (pack accordingly.)

Mike is on for a meet up at WalMart in Socorro at noon. Robin, due to prior scheduling, will most likely be showing up at Saturday 09:38:47ish.

Max, not to worry, your font is showing up on my Toshiba as appropriately equal to everyone else’s. I only own a dumb fone (phone) but on my laptop to increase or decrease font I hold down the CTRL key on the bottom row of my keyboard and then hit + or - to increase or decrease font size.

Greg(g) and you can drag more people along so that we don’t O.D. on too much fun!

I’m thinking of picking up some packages of hotdogs and maybe hamburgers at WalMart in an effort to move our cholesterol levels up into the normal range.
Mike will throw a grill in his trailer and with some rocks and charcoal briquettes we should be good to cook over a fire or coals. I’ll have a big jug with enough water for all of us. I’ll have along my deep cycle battery and inverter for recharging radios, phones iPods, cameras, etc. Mike and I haven’t yet decided but we are going to come equipped to stay past Sunday if we wish.
There are two antennas on Gray Hill and maybe one or both are cell towers. We will only be 12 miles past Magdalena so maybe they have a cell tower on the mountain to their south. My wife tells me east of Magdalena she had no service.
We just don’t know what this site will offer.
The rainy weather that we are having here in Las Cruces should be done by the weekend.
below is are pictures of outside my house.

Hail yes..JPG (80.18 KiB) Viewed 3422 times

Hail of a storm 10-21-15.JPG (101.26 KiB) Viewed 3422 times

[RobinHastings]

Yeah, Wednesday was a good day not to be in the air. But, hey, we always need the water!

See you guys on Saturday (or maybe late Friday night, if I get ambitious.) Where do you think we'll be camping?
-Robin

[RobinHastings]

GRAY HILL, MAGDALENA, NEW MEXICO
Well, it all turned out pretty well. We had a number of pilots attend - 4 PG, 4 HG - and maybe we should rename the site Mount Montgomery, because Max Montgomery of Albuquerque did most of the flying, using his PG. Dan Blanchard of Artesia pioneered a launch at an adjacent, 250-ft eminence we could call Dan's Hill, or maybe Blanchard's Mound. Gray Hill is 550 feet AGL and about 7650 ft MSL, according to Google Earth. Camping was good, but got chilly a couple of nights. Winds on Friday were west/northwest, I heard, and Max did a lot of flying that day, thermalling up above the height of the enormous microwave relay tower that dominates the hill. I didn't arrive until Saturday, convoying in from Socorrow with Dan. Winds on Saturday were strong northeast, but when Dan and I were ready to launch, late in the afternoon, they turned strong east. No good launch on Gray Hill in that direction. Sunday the winds were strong east and southeast through the day, but Mike Ellsworth inspired us to hike Dan and his Falcon 195 to Dan's Hill (it only took 12 minutes) with excellent results when Dan flew the place. (Dan's Hill will take winds from the west, south and east.) On Monday Max did lots of soaring of Gray Hill in west and southwest winds, and I pioneered the west launch in my U2 hang glider with a 3-4 minute sled ride. Bill and Mike had winds too light for their liking, the rest of the day, and did not fly after I left at 1:30 pm. That's the brief summary of the weekend - I'll let Bill give you the complete story. It's a really nice site in many ways.
-Robin

[Bill Cummings]

The weekend of October 23rd through the 26th 2015 had several hang gliding pilots from southern New Mexico and several paraglider pilots from northern New Mexico converge on a new site named Gray Hill.

Mike Ellsworth, HG pilot, has been talking this place up for ten years and finally inspired enough interest among pilots to explore this low hill site that is on BLM property. Camping and flying go well here. Lots of open grassland for landing.
The top also is very open with large easy set up and launching areas.

Gray Hill is 40 miles, by road, WSW of Socorro New Mexico and ten miles east of the Very Large Array, National Radio Astronomy Observatory, Radio Telescope(s).

Northeast to East is the only direction that poses any concerns for launching.

One would leave Interstate 25 at either Socorro exit 147 or 150 to access Hwy 60 and go west toward the town of Magdalena. Eleven miles WSW of Magdalena Hwy 60 bends to go WNW but just 0.7 of a mile beyond the bend in the road you will turn south southwest and already you will see the two towers on Gray Hill two miles to the south. (Of course pilots should fly a safe distance from the two towers. (Full bars on my Verizon cell phone.)

Gray Hill’s difficulty would range from P1 and higher and H1 and higher but is an unregulated site.

Next a quote from Joe F. that I find apropos.

“EVERY landowner is immune from liability when non-invitation and non-charging relationship maintains. Working confidently with the facts may well win much more "sites" for HG than the addictive push of a waiver that pretends to give the landowner something THEY ALREADY HAVE (but may not be aware of adequately). The waiver in the faces of landowners may now be working against the aims of the HG community. All USA states have seen the benefit to landowners and the citizens and have thus enacted statutes about free recreational use of properties. Note: Keep the "vehicle" status that FAA extends to hang gliding; FAA separates hang gliders from aircraft; do not establish airstrips or "airports" on properties; just run and jump into sky and land your recreational vehicle. EVER be a respectful user of property. Know the stark difference between charge-control-invite and the distinct simple arrival and use. U$hPa was born at a different time when the current immunity status was not in place; a new era may grow, if the HG community emphasizes the facts while being exemplary gracing users of properties.”
(Last edited by JoeF on Tue Oct 27, 2015 10:16 am, edited 3 times in total.)

It is my opinion also that as long as we only use Gray Hill for, no fee - no invitation - and only recreational solo flying there will never arise the need for any controlling interest, insurance or waiver.

I’m proud to say that when the last stragglers left on Tuesday no mark was left on the ground except for tire tracks on the road.

Max Montgomery PG, as far as any of us know, is the first pilot to fly this site.
Robin Hastings HG, as far as any of us know, is the first hang gliding pilot to fly this site.
Mike Ellsworth flew his RC glider to check the winds for us.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jlnaa3GyUiM

[Bill Cummings]

RGSA/Hawks,
Friday 23, 2015 as Mike Ellsworth and I arrived at the west base of Gray Hill, which is eleven miles WSW of the town of Magdalena New Mexico (USA), Max Montgomery dropped in to greet us at 1:30.
As far as we know this was the first flight from this site ever. Max was flying his PG, APCO, Vista 3, 27 Meters. He jumped in and we drove to the top.

As the winds switched to out of the NW Max launched again at 2:45 (? not sure) and did his first top landing at 3:10. He relaunched after a short kiting pause to sink out in diminishing winds to land at 3:14 at the road's hairpin part way to the lower landing zone (LZ).

Female PG pilot ---????--Lea?-- maybe Li? --- maybe Lea? (Help me out here Max) launched at 4:11 and flew through a thermal and had a 4 minute ride to the bottom.
She again launched at 4:50 went through a small thermal and had a three and a half minute ride to the LZ.

Max took off again at 4:59 and landed on top at 5:05.

Saturday all the PG pilots drove to checked out Cat Mountain 3 miles to the east but a locked gate was in the way on state land. (??)
Lea had to head home and Gregg, wife and two non pilot pets also had to leave.

Robin Hastings and Dan Blanchard arrived on Saturday. They set up but the wind went from NW to NE and then switched to East.
Northeast to East don't have a clear way to launch and power lines are just a little way from a launch that would otherwise be okay.
Both left their gliders set up and tied to small Pinion Pine bushes for the night.
We stayed up until 12:40 am swapping lies but I gave up and went to bed when I realized that I was not as good as everyone else.

For a site that has such a wide launch perimeter we picked a poor weekend due to the wind direction.

Sunday October 25, Robin, Mike, Dan and I walked over to a smaller hill to the SW of Gray Hill and Dan flew his Falcon 195 HG down into a SE wind.
We named the hill Dan's Summit.
Max Summit is from the highest part of Gray Hill.
Max returned Monday but I gave up trying to remember how bad he skunked Mike and I. It was too light for HG. Mike and I were the only two to stay over until Tuesday morning. It was windy enough but cold enough that lack of interest quickly over took us.
Max had plugged my leaking left front tire with two plugs and Tuesday it was the only tire holding air. I had to air up the other three. Time for new tires.

We had along more food than we could eat so my wife and I are still working on left overs.

October gets cold at 7,650' so next year I'll be pushing for September for a camping, flying, trip at Gray Hill.
Oops! I almost forgot, Robin Hastings flew the 1st HG from Gray Hill as far as we know.
This post is an effort to fill in a little more detail about our first trip to Gray Hill.

[RobinHastings]

It sounds like our new pilot in Lordsburg, Wyatt, would like to fly Little Floridas this weekend in his PG. I might be busy with family obligations, but I'd sure like to meet him if not. Bill, what about you? Can you guide him?
-Robin

[Bill Cummings]

RGSA/Hawks,
I’ll be driving for (PG) Wyatt tomorrow at the Little Floridas. We will be meeting at the entrance road to the LZ where it leaves the Rock Hound Road pavement.
I’ll have my glider rack on the Xterra so HG’ers will have a way up too.
Wyatt and I will meet at noon.

Sat-Sun 31 & 01, 2015.JPG (41.4 KiB) Viewed 3375 times