Quadcopter

    The drone has been with me for 2 1/2 days and I haven't destroyed it yet, although it isn't for not trying. I flew it around in the kitchen a bit the evening that I got it just enough to realize that this wasn't a really fabulous idea. The next morning I flew it in the yard in hopes of getting a picture of the magnolia blossoms that only start about 20 feet in the air. This wasn't such a hot idea either. As I mentioned, I crashed it in one of the red cedars in front of my door. It was a plain miracle that it was exactly high enough but no higher such that I could get it down. Years ago, a tree fell on our cyclone fence, destroying part of it. Fence posts are hard to uproot but fence poles (the horizontal part) are easy to carry off and "neighbors" did so. But one was left so I liberated it. Getting up on my lawn chair, I brought my little friend down. It would barely fly, but I had been burning up the battery to make a noise so I could find the darn thing (red cedars are pretty dense). When I charged it up again, though it was fine.
    Yesterday, I took it to the park. It's remarkable how few tree-free areas there are around here. There's the river, but that doesn't help. Fortunately school is out today, so a lot of athletic fields suddenly become available. (Hopefully!) I had silly giggly fun flying it about and kept it out of the river and out of trees. Eventually it became too windy so I actually bailed before the battery ran out.
    Today I tried to combine my interests in hiking and aeronautics and went to a spot on 12,000 Year Historical Park trail where there is an underground natural gas line and thus the trees are cleared to road width. (The park I picked yesterday, Canal Park, is also dominated by high tension power lines which did indeed introduce an element of, you know, high tension.) The cleared area looks a lot smaller when you're trying to fly a drone than when you're hiking by. But it was a pretty good spot and I had fun. Interesting thing as that there are several switches for fine tuning flight but I never got around to trying them. The quadcopter seemed to correct itself, which was lucky. My first few experiences were very much "OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD! THING REALLY FLIES!" which probably didn't help. But I don't think I was all THAT panicky; I think it's just flying better. Eventually I got a good enough hover that I could take pictures of it and with it. They haven't turned out great, but I bet a cloudier day will help. Dang thing is major fun; when the spare battery arrives and I can play with it twice as long, I'll be dangerous. (It takes an hour and a half to get eight or nine minutes fly time. Always a fly in the ointment!)