4/20 Skyline 15M Manta 3

[bigwavedave]

With decent wind in the forecast and with my kites still in the back of my car Fred, Tyson and I decided to journey down to skyline to get one of what we thought might be the last days in on the snow. We arrived there about 1:45 or so to plenty of snow but very marginal southeast wind. We sat around for about a half hour before it came up just a bit. We threw out the biggest kites - 15M for fred and I and 12M for Tyson. A Visitor from Mammoth showed up (Dave) and pulled out his 12M as well. I launched expecting to go nowhere but immediately was able to ride over to the back side of the front hill and loop up the hill where the wind was stronger. Got good rides for about 45 minutes before the wind jumped up quickly to high teens low twenties. The rest of the afternoon into the evening was epic! The visitor from mammoth went back to re-rig to his 10m but the rest of us stuck with the original. Great reaches on the east side of the front hill with killer ridge-lift on the top of the steep section made for killer big airs and good hang-times. I was surprised there weren't more people there (but pleased we had the hill to ourselves). There was still penty of snow there and with the exception of a couple of soft deep spots it was a pretty stable managable snow pack that was only midly sticky. With the new snow they'll be getting in the next few days I suspect there'll still be a couple good weeks of riding there if not more.