Andrew has really been wracking up the airtime over the past week. Wracking up this sort of experience during what used to be considered the off season is exactly what is required to perform at your best as next season rolls around. Let’s hear about it:

The weekend of 9 – 10 May saw Dave and myself crack up around 3+ hours.  Sat Dave and I hit up Pig and enjoyed two extended sled runs turning in little bubbles that never managed to provide enough to climb in as they were short and sharp.  After 2 turns it would be gone and it was time to move on.  We observed two eagles fly past climb a few meters then fly off never getting any higher than the hill.  The inversion around was visible and it seemed that we were about at the top of it on the hill!  Top notch fun all the same.

Sunday Dave, Turtle, Barnsy, Marty (from VIC) and late in the arvo Porter flew Lake G (no cars were damaged during Porters Landing which was a relief ).  It was an absolute ripper of a day with smooth air and nice ridge lift.  About 1km North of Gearies Gap on the top of the ridge line there was a back burn happening and Dave managed to get up to 4500ft in a steady 200ft/min up.  I also managed to climb up but only to around 3700ft.

From here Dave flew the ridge all the way to Collector with my self and Turtle getting to the wineries a little low.  I turned back to the south to head back to the higher ridge and better lift where as Turtle kept going and ended up landing in a rather unusual landing paddock.  As he flew around to the winery he ended up lower than the ridge and lost lift and then couldn’t make it out to the lake so landed in a paddock between the highway and the ridge.  Funny as, but gutsy effort to try to punch north.  Lesson Learned here is to always have a nice place to land within glide   Dave and I top landed back at Gearies a little later and Dave headed home.  I stayed on to keep flying and enjoyed a number of top landings and flying on the south side flying in the air around my mates R/C gliders.  It is always cool flying around with R/C slope gliders.  I managed to grab one of my mates planes and turned it tail wind and let is go hahahaha.  Not nice I know but he was high and had plenty of height to recover in – fun times!

Tuesday 12 May saw Dave and I head to Stanwell Park for a leisurely Maz.  Our enthusiasm paid off with both of us cracking up over 2 hours.  After about an hour in the air Dave headed South to the next ridge.  I decided to go hell for leather for it also and was defiant to the end, which was a very low end at that!!!  I go to the south ridge very low and ended up having to turn back and land on the south side of Stanwell beach.  Lucky for me Tony Armstrong was on his way back to launch so after he confirmed that I was a Hangy I was in the car and on the way back to launch to get my car.  I drove back down to get my glider and after the quickest pack up and and then set up once back on launch I was airborne again.  By this point the wind had eased and the chance of flying up and down the coast any great distance had gone.  After a while Dave went into land approaching over a pond on the Southern side of the beach.  From the air it looked cool and once down he was straight on the radio telling me that I had to make the same approach as it was awesome.  After 20min I decided to land and came screaming in over the pond and landed on the beach.  It was nice to land in the silky smooth coastal air as it feels like you are landing on a bed of foam as it is so smooth you wouldn’t know you were flying which is a little different feeling after flying inland all summer!!!  A big thanks to Tony for taking me up to my car and having a laugh or two on the way.  Cheers.

Anyway a great week has been had as usual with the Canberra crew.  If only we were all keen we might get out there and fly more often !!!!!

Thief >;-)