A group of us went to the Women's Fly-in in Washington, one of the last (if not THE last) event of the year. Being at the end of October it's often more about seeing friends and the costume party than the flying. This year it was quite windy, but most people ended up flying once on Saturday and then grabbed a chilly flight Sunday morning before heading home.
I was trying to convince one of my friends to come but he said it made him too sad. Fall shows it's full splendor in Chelan, complete with the cold temperatures and the dim lighting in the sky that announces that autumn is here. He said that going down there reinforces that the flying season is over and he'd rather not have it shoved in his face. Fair enough. It was still fun to fly out over the lake & do a bit of acro (only to get down to warm up, of course). Heh.
We did manage to squeak in a flight here at home a few days ago between fronts. It was windy & a bit gusty on launch and even with long underwear, down jacket & balaclava I was still shivering. We played around, dodging the cloud's grabby tendrils and exploring the whole ridge in the abundant lift.
Fun, but a little sad too. That flight left no room for doubt that summer was definitely over and the only hope to find happy thermic flights is to fly far, far away.
