One of our favorite routes:

Counter clockwise.

Just before we launch:

Must have been twenty pilots here today plus a load of tandems. The place was
jumping.

I was off first and there was a big thermal right at the south end of the
runway. The tug just kept going up and up. I pinned off at 1,500' and just kept
climbing to cloud base at 4,200'. The idea was to fly together, but I decided to
take off and dawdle toward the first turnpoint waiting for Cory, Larry and John
to catch up.

There were no cu's out to the west and northwest as I headed out in that
direction. No cu's over the Green Swamp with its stretches of no landing areas.
As I proceeded toward the first turnpoint due west of Quest with a course line
directly over the Green Swamp I shaded to the north to stay near reachable
landable areas. The cu's started to build.

I headed back to the southwest as the cu's formed over the Green Swamp and was
able to climb to 4,800', but then was down to 1,600' as I scrambled to the
northwest to get just south of the lumber mill on highway 471. The lift there
averaged 500 fpm and I was soon over 5,300' and flying fast to stay out of the
cloud. I've got to remember to pay more attention.

Larry and John were following me on the radio and as I headed west they were
heading for my thermal south of the lumber mill. It was still happening when
they got there.

Larry and I got close together at the turnpoint. John has just behind us with
Cory underneath him as Larry and I headed south toward the south end of the
Green Swamp and the next turnpoint. Cory and John were climbing fast but still
had a ways to go to get to the turnpoint.

Larry and I headed south along the western edge of the Green Swamp. There were
plenty of cu's ahead and we traded off finding them. John joined us. Cory took a
bad line toward the turnpoint and got down to 800'. He had to work his way back
up.

We worked lift over the Green Swamp to good affect and headed out over it toward
the south turnpoint all now working together. There was plenty of lift and cu's
on the way.

At the turnpoint John head toward the next turnpoint but Larry and I knew better
and headed east south east under a bank of clouds aiming to get plenty high
first. Larry called John to stop with his recklessness and come join us. He did
and we all got high.

We headed east to get to the eastern side of the Green Swamp but not so far that
we had to leave the Green Swamp. We ended up about three kilometers west of the
Seminole Glider Port. It was easy getting back to Quest from there.

Larry and I skipped our turnpoint at highway 474 and 33, but John made it there
and came in later. We were all waiting on Ken and Cory and they came in about
half an hour later. They were super excited.

Ken Kinzie writes:

Up to now conditions have been light, typically 1-200 fpm and
maxing out at 3-4000'. Today was different with the best conditions so far this
year.

Davis set a task counter clockwise around the Green Swamp. Climbs were 4-700 fpm
and base was up to 5400. 7 made the attempt. 5 of us made it. I forgot to turn
on my Airtribune App: (Here is Davis's track showing the 4 turn points
https://airtribune.com/davisstraub/tracks__25478).

I launched at 12:45 and was slow getting on course. It was good to join up with
Corey Barnwell near the first turn point as we chased Davis, Larry Bunner and
John Simon. Corey and I barely finished as our last thermal topped out around
4400' at 11 miles from Quest. No wind but a lot of zero sink enabled us to make
it back around 5 PM with 800' to spare! My instruments have gone missing so I am
trying to get my track log from my spare 76S. Rob Bunner was kind to lend me his
older Flytec.

Tomorrow Davis plans to set the same task but clockwise. Maybe I'll take Mary's
advise make up a check list that includes activating Airtribune.

I publish the OLC records so that pilots can get used to seeing
these things on line and perhaps following my example:

http://www.onlinecontest.org/olc-2.0/para/flightinfo.html?flightId=110275871

http://www.paraglidingforum.com/leonardo/flight/1337043

http://www.xcontest.org/world/en/flights/detail:davisstraub/21.2.2016/17:24

You can familiarize yourself with what is available.