What altitude did James reach in the Superlite???

Today was an extraordinarily beautiful day in Wichita. Light winds; blue sky; puffy cumulus. The airport was buzzing: two helicopters, a tow plane, at least two gliders, a C182, a Aeronca, and the Belite Superlite Sun N Fun winner.

I wanted to test some instrumentation; buzz a friend's house (with his permission); and test fuel consumption in the Superlite. Also, I wanted to climb a long ways up and see what the world liked like.

All successful. The icing on the cake was throwing a roll of toilet paper at my friend Kevin. (A couple of hours later: somehow it reappeared on my front lawn.)

Even though it was a T-shirt day on the ground, I wore my leather coat in preparation for much colder weather up high. When I got up there, I loitered over the gliderport for a long time. I shot video of KAAO (Jabara airport) off in the distance; and although I did not have a true altimeter with me, the video says it all. Very chilly.!



If the blog video won't open, it is also posted on youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/beliteaircraft#p/u/0/peTwoxkIxg0

How high was I?? I'd appreciate your guess.... The Jabara runway is 6101 feet long!

Please place a guess in the comments. Thanks!!