Colorado

My midwest travels took me to a several day stay in Boulder, Colorado. I made a day trip to the mountians and spent part of this day searching for an abandoned railroad trestle bridge in the wilderness. I never found the bridge so after lunch I went exploring Rollins Pass, also with a view to trying to find a couple of trestle bridges that were marked on my map. In hindsight I should have taken a different route. Having not reached any of my planned objectives, but having a great day in the mountains nevertheless, I finally set up my KAP gear in a park along the roadside in Rollins Pass.

My FLED saved me on this one. The FLED is the glamorous name given to one of the designs of kite I fly. I first launched my ROK (another kite) to about 200 feet with the fairly strong breeze going up the valley. I attached the rig and then found I couldn’t get the camera higher than 20 feet off the ground. I played around for 1/2 hour and then gave up. I put up my FLED to the same height and attached the camera and let out more line and away she went. Other than the occasional quick drop when the wind lapsed, I had a great session with this kite. As a low-wind lifter, up to now I’ve had the tendency to save the FLED for the direst of circumstances and not given it a fair chance to perform. Today’s situation worked well. I guess there was less wind at higher elevation than in the valley, but it was enough for the FLED and not the ROK despite getting both kites high enough to attach the rig.

These photographs were taken using kite aerial photography (KAP).

Shot of the river, train tracks and road. Note the park and picnic tables. The kite line is visible in this image.