Busy, Busy, Busy (part 1)

This past weekend was one of the busiest we’ve had in a while. The Carolina Kite Club was asked to participate in Kite Day at Sturgeon City Park in Jacksonville, NC. The Parks & Recreation Dept. sponsored this activity to promote family fun. The club was invited to put some kites in the sky and help those attending with their kites. Small diamond kites were provided for the kids to decorate and fly. They could also bring their own kites.

Weather-wise, it was great. The temperature was not too hot and the sky had scattered, puffy white clouds. Wind-wise, it was a different story. There was no wind for most of the morning. The club members positioned themselves at the top of the hill in order to find what little wind was available.

Kites went up and kites came down. Kids ran around pulling their kites behind them. There were even a couple of optimistic souls trying to fly stunt kites. Despite the lack of kite-flying success, everyone seemed to be having a good time at the park.

More flying to come.

Fair Winds All.

Five At Once

My acquisition of new kites has continued. I obtained two more White Bird dragons on eBay this week. Months and months go by and White Bird kites are hard to come by. Then there is an influx of them as people empty their kite bags for one reason or another. So the latest additions to my collection are a 25 ft. Rainbow dragon and a 25 ft. Sun Face dragon.

The Rainbow dragon completes a set of Rainbow dragons of varying sizes. Putting them up at one time should look pretty impressive in the sky. The Sun Face adds another unique sail design to my collection.

The hard part about getting new kites is not being able to fly them when they arrive. We had house guests for the weekend and we missed the weekly kite club fly at Fort Macon State Park. This seems to be happening more and more often lately. Though I’m not complaining, I do have to get my kite fix or suffer withdrawal. So this afternoon I went to the beach and flew all of my latest White Bird additions. Five dragon kites in the sky. What a wondrous sight.

The two on the left are the latest additions. The middle kite is the White Bird Golden Gate dragon. The two on the right are both White Bird Friendly Dragon dragons. I think of them as the brothers and, true to form, they fought in the sky, tangled their lines and brought each other down. I had to separate them.

White Bird Friendly Dragon Dragons (The Brothers)

It was a great day at the beach. The wind was not too strong and the temperature was not too hot. I would have liked to stay longer but I was given a dinner invitation that I couldn’t refuse. It meant I didn’t have to cook and I didn’t have to do the dishes. And if you’re wondering how one person flies five kites at once. Here’s our secret (which is not really a secret at all). Sand bags made from inexpensive nylon backpacks.

Fair Winds All.

New Kites And Other Things

The weekly Carolina Kite Club fly didn’t go very well this week. There was no wind, lots of heat and humidity and way too many “no-see-ums”. For those of you who don’t know, the no-see-um is an extremely small flying insect that has a big bite. They are annoying and persistent. Where there is one, there are a thousand and no bug repellant seems to keep them away. They can make a beautiful day miserable.

There has been kite activity in the past couple of weeks. Most of it did not involve flying however. Some hours were spent doing line maintenance. Specifically the untangling of a rat’s nest of a quad line set. At first it looked hopeless but with a little persistence and patience, I now have a line set ready to use. As long as I was working on quad lines, I rewound two other sets in order to reduce the possibility of future tangles. Less time untangling, more time flying.

There were some additions made to the kite bags recently. I managed to add a couple of White Bird dragon kites to my collection. One was the Golden Gate Bridge dragon, a pattern I hadn’t seen before and one not found on their catalogue pages. The other is a Friendly Dragon dragon. I already had three Friendly Dragon dragons in different sizes. This one gives me a complete family. The purchases bring my White Bird dragon collection up to a total of eleven. My ultimate plan is to put every dragon I own in the air at the same time. A festival of White Birds. There will be pictures when I do it.

Fair Winds All.

I Couldn’t Wait

This week I am missing the Carolina Kite Club fly. But I had just finished the pigtails and train lines for a Revolution kite stack and really wanted to get out and try it. Yes, lately it seems I’ve been “stack” crazy. I stacked my Dream On and my Little Dreamer and added to my stack of Goblins. Now, I’m stacking quad line kites. I had seen stacks of Revolutions on photos from some of the large kite festivals. They looked like fun and a challenge.

RevStack6 — Kites Unlimited Custom Kites by Revolution

Not being an expert flyer, I decided to start with a small stack. I have two kites that have the same sail pattern, the Kites Unlimited Custom Revolutions. One is a full sail and the other is a vented sail. So I went out one evening when the wind was about 10 mph and the temperature had gone down to something bearable. My mind was picturing tangled lines and ugly crashes. instead I had a wonderful time. The two kites flew as one with just a slight pull on the lines. The only time things got wobbly was close to the ground where the wind got a little light. And, even then, it was controllable. I’m looking forward to taking these out again. And again and again.