The Devils Surprise

The Devil typically lies dormant when the sea breeze blows, during the summer months. However, with all indicators to the contrary, he can provide a pleasant surprise, with bountiful thermals, on any given day. I don't mean to allude, today was far from epic, I never got above launch, but, I pleasantly soared below an atypically thick, 2500' marine layer.

With only a trivial amount of optimism, I launch Juniper on Diablo, grab a handful of cord, point my toes and aim towards Macedo Ranch in Alamo.

On the way I see birds circling and fly through three seconds of solid lift for a second time. Thats it, I scrub the plan for Macedo, roll into the grassy brown hills and get rewarded with thermals aplenty.
The thermals continually top at 2500' as I enjoy my West side soaring with the hawks. After feeling content, I top out above the Thousand Footer and head off towards Pine Canyon en route to my original destination, Macedo Ranch.

Crossing Pine Canyon with decent altitude I enthusiastically turn towards Wall Point Road.

As I hoped, I find more lift. It tops out lower than the lift over the mountain, but, provides another nice surprise.
This side is certainly softer, so I work my way out in the burbly lift. A nice view back towards Pine Ridge and Mount Diablo.
Circling over Macedo Ranch I notice a decent drift to the North. Another big surprise today, South surface wind. This is the one direction that doesn't work at Macedo Ranch unless you like landing on roof tops. Oh well, at least I'll have a moderate uphill slope to tune up my downwind landing technique.
I turn final with a ton of ground speed.
And float high up the hill. Today, I use the technique of stopping my forward momentum quickly, by planting the nose cone firmly on the ground. Although this an effective way to stop a glider, I think with enough practice I could eventually use my feet instead. Even on tailwind landing up to ten, given a moderate slope. Although, I hope to not get much more practice at this. You can't pick your surprises, some are good and others, well, it's only a grass stain.