Today at Cliffside, three hangs (Gabe , Mark and myself) and approx 10 paragliders showed up in the afternoon to fly. All forecasts called for really light east winds (0-3 mph) all day. However, it was blowing more than 10mph in the morning when I arrived Cliffside around 9:30am. It was definitely soarable in the morning but since I don't want to fly alone so I went to Mark Rabe's Goldendale property in the morning instead. Mark gave me a tour as we drove on quads exploring his property (in first part of the video)). We headed to Cliffside afterwards and arrived launch around 12:30pm. The winds was weaker compared to the morning, but still blowing 10-13mph at the upper launch. Paragliding Rick (from Ellensburg, WA) launched around 12:45. He hooked up to some good thermals and got a couple hundred feet above launch. Then the winds started to diminish when we (and other paragliders) were ready to launch so we took a sledders. Thanks to paraglider Rebecca for picking us up. The winds remained weak, so many paragliders had just short flights in the afternoon. Gabe arrived around 3 pm and the three of us hang waiting for an hour and still see no improvement for soaring conditions. Gabe and Mark took a sledder at 4:30pm. I launched at 4:45 and surprisingly I felt some weak lifts along the ridge. I was able to soar and had the whole ridge to myself for 20 mins. I think it turned on really late today, probably 30 mins (5:30pm) before sunset and a few paragliders had some very nice late evening soaring flights today.
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