California Rambling: A family affair in the air

As Rick Indrebo banked his German-built Grob 103 glider toward the landing strip at Crazy Creek Air Adventures in Middletown, a pair of turkey vultures turned similarly, gliding on air currents above Lake County.  The Cameron Park pilot is ranked among the nation’s best competition glider pilots, though on this trip – as on many others – he was lending a hand to his father and the family business, taking tourists aloft to soar like the birds.

The Indrebo family operates Crazy Creek Air Adventures, providing glider and bi-plane excursions from a gentle valley east of Mt. St. Helena.  Operated by Jim and Connie Indrebo, Rick’s parents, Crazy Creek provides 20, 30 and 40-minute glider rides, just about any day… just call.

It’s a family affair, with Rick helping his parents when he’s not piloting 737s for American Airlines or competing in glider competitions.  Even Rick’s five-year-old son, Joel, is eager to lift a wingtip and run alongside the glider until the tow plane gains enough speed for the wings to stay level.  Connie says, little Joel almost didn’t let go once and got airborne a few inches before remembering, but then it’s hard to keep an Indrebo on the ground.

The Indrebo family’s passion for soaring and gliding began when Jim, now in his 70s, was a school boy during World War II.  An episode of “The Adventures of Smilin Jack” had its protagonist, the dashing, flying cap and goggles-wearing, comic strip aviator Smilin Jack, flying a glider from a cliff to rendezvous with a submarine.  That strip inspired Jim’s boyhood interest in becoming a pilot in order to fly gliders.  As soon as he was old enough to do so, Jim Indrebo fulfilled that dream and has been soaring since.

Both Jim and his son fly competitively, Jim has won several competitions and championships.  Though, asked about Rick’s prowess in glider competitions, Jim quipped, “Rick’s ranked around eighth in the nation right now, and if he’s eighth, then I’m probably seventh.”

Gliding is to flying as sailing is to boating.  Both sports involve deriving motive power from nature, once launched.  A glider (or sailplane) is an aircraft without an engine.  It is towed to altitude by a powered aircraft, and then the glider pilot pulls a lever to release the glider from the tow line and fly away on its own.   The simplest form of glider is a paper airplane.  The most sophisticated of them can stay aloft for hours and fly hundreds of miles.  Rick Indrebo’s longest flight took eight hours, covering some 400 miles.  “The length of the ride,” Jim explains, “depends upon how high you go.”

Endurance aloft is achieved by riding thermals, which are streams of warm air created when sunlight heats the ground. When being towed to the release point, you feel the thermals shaking the aircraft as it passes through them.  That’s less noticeable when in free flight.  “Did you feel that?” Rick asked as our glider flew at 4,500 ft. over 4,300 ft. Mt. St. Helena, “We just went up a hundred feet.”

Once a glider pilot finds a thermal, the pilot will ride it, gaining altitude, then flies to another likely point to ride another thermal.  On long-distance flights, glider pilots move from thermal to thermal, anticipating where they might be and using them to gain altitude, speed or distance.  On tourist rides, such as given at Crazy Creek, the landscape and its thermals are known.

Lake County is renowned for its clear, sunny days, the kind that produce thermals dependably.  It also has some of the cleanest air.  Lake County was graded an “A” for having one of the lowest levels of ozone air pollution in the nation.  To receive that grade, measurements could not exceed the ozone standard within three years, as determined by continuous air monitoring.  What that means for gliders is that the scenery is virtually unobstructed by haze.  Soaring over Mt. St. Helena, the Pacific could be seen to the west while Clear Lake and 7000-foot peaks of the Northern California Coastal Range were viewed to the north.

The view was so impressive that it’s hard to imagine how a pilot pays attention to air speed, altitude and location.  Unlike the constant din heard inside a powered aircraft, the glider was nearly quiet with only a slight whistle from the air vent.   From a distance, a glider is silent, but as it approaches it screams.  When Jim made a thrilling low-level fly-by on his return to the glider port, his American-built Schweizer 2-32 whizzed past, excitingly.

The entire morning at Crazy Creek was one for the senses.  It began upon arriving in the oak and chaparral-ringed valley which was still green with spring grasses and splashed with bands of yellow globe lilies, purple hyacinth, orange California poppy and sherbet-colored mariposa tulips.  Connie met our group with sweetly scented, freshly baked gingerbread and Joel hummed as he flew well-used metal toy airplanes off a landing strip formed by the glider port’s deck railing.

The Indrebos haven’t always offered glider rides from this idyllic location, though it seems to be one ideally suited for them.   In 1968, Jim began providing public flights in the Napa Valley at his Calistoga Soaring Center, which became known as one of the largest and safest full-service glider ports in the country.  He moved the operation to Lake County in 1991, relocating the creek in order to lay out his 4,000 by 150 ft. grass runway.  Today, Crazy Creek is the perfect setting from which to soar like the birds with one of America’s great soaring families.

For more information, visit CrazyCreekAirAdventures.com or call 707-987-9293.