Up, Up, and ... Uh-Oh
Skills

Above the Mojave, sans engine

By Michael Parrish

California city municipal airport, a drowsy landing strip in the Mojave Desert two hours north of Los Angeles, is not exactly air-traffic central. I've come to take a soaring lesson, to probe an obsession that's grown since I first moved here and noticed the long, thin wings of gliders floating overhead. But as I crawl into the craft's tight front seat, I recall that, on rare occasions, imperfectly attached glider wings suddenly rip off, converting a sleek flying machine into an 860-pound fiberglass stone.

Such thoughts clearly don't trouble Cindy Brickner. One-half of Caracole Soaring (760-373-1019) and a pilot for two decades, Brickner calmly explains the controls: joystick, rudder pedals, and simple instrument panel. Her partner, Marty Eiler, attaches his tow plane rope and soon our German-made Schleicher AS-K 21 is airborne, albeit just a few feet above ground. Soon we go for altitude, which is a big deal around here: The world record of 49,009 feet was set from this airfield 13 years ago.

Though sailplanes date to the 1850s — when octogenarian Sir George Cayley first soared over Brompton Dale — the sport has always been a sleeper, with only 65,000 pilots now licensed in the United States. Not too surprising, given that lessons at Caracole cost $67 per hour and you need at least 25 hours of instruction before soloing. But here, at least, the outlay seems well worth it: These perpetually sunny skies, shared with Edwards Air Force Base, are among the best for soaring, especially in winter, thanks to an air-current pattern known as mountain wave lift. Wave lift occurs when fast-moving air crosses a range, falls into a valley, then bounces back up. Riding that bounce feels like shooting skyward in a glassed-in elevator, with the ground receding at up to 2,000 feet per minute.

When Brickner turns the controls over, I quickly lose a thousand feet of her cleverly won altitude. A glance reassures that the wings are still there, but steering in three dimensions proves quite a challenge. "Hold the stick like a champagne glass," she tells me, taking over. We bomb down at 125 miles an hour, pop back up, and come in for a steep, smooth landing on the nose wheel — so perfect, in fact, that I'm already contemplating lesson two.