Ed is writing a little something for Soaring Australia about our recent trip the Bright. So far he is up to the Monday where they chased me out to Toc but I am hanging out for his account from Tuesday where he heads off on his first XC - and what a flight it was.

After 2 days of rained out flying (don’t shed too many tears for me - wine tasting, cheese tasting, berry farms, nut farms great company and much talk of hangliding made for a pretty bloody good 2 days) we awoke to a beautiful sunny day in Bright. After breakfast we headed out to the airfield. Our hopes were soon subdued and eventually shattered. “Too windy and damn bumpy up there”, was the quote from Shane who had just landed his trike after a very bumpy flight to test the conditions. Bugger ! Someone suggested that we could go to The Pines.

“The Pines, The Pines sucks donkey balls” Trent’s replied with absolute contempt.

“What’s wrong with The Pines?” I queried.

“Let me put it to you this way, every time they have a competition in this area, and the only place that it’s on is The Pines, everyone votes for a rest day. That’s how bad The Pines are.” Trent added.

“But if that’s the only place it’s on we may as well give it a go”.

“The Pines it is,” Trent relented.

So not particularly enthused we went to The Pines. Once at the bombout of The Pines we found some very helpful people who advised us that Trent’s Santee Fe couldn’t possibly make it to the top of this behemoth mountain. There is a a “boggy patch” and a really “gnarly section at the top”. We would have to cross load into a “real 4WD”. The same people were kind enough to offer to take one more glider on their roof (I think it already had about 5 or 6 gliders on the roof) but buggered if we could find anyone to take the other glider up. There were some serious 4WDs with some serious racks that couldn’t possibly fit anymore than the 3 gliders that they already had on top. It’s not like the brethren to leave a pilot swinging. Where I come from in Canberra, pilots help each other, regardless whether you are of “hangi” or punter persuasion. Anyway there was nothing else for it but to struggle as best we could up as far as we could to the top before getting out and carrying the glider up this beastie hill. After about 10km of driving we discovered the “boggy patch”. It looked like someone had spilt a bucket of water on the track …. not quite the scary, snorkel necessary, periscope required bottomless loch that was described. Next we encountered the “gnarly” section at the top. It did admittedly get pretty steep and rocky … for about the last 50m. Suffice to say we ended up driving right to the top no problems at all.

Trent and I were among the very first hangies setup so I went over to inspect the launch and time the cycles and generally get a feel for the site having never flown here before. The Para guys started taking off around the time I walked over and some were getting some real snippets of lift but some were getting some horrendous sink. One Para particularly was heading out over the pine forest to the bottom left of launch a bit low and dropped like a rock for what must have been about 50ft and luckily wasn’t too far in over the trees as he did an immediate 180 and got out over the bomb out and landed not that far into it. I’d just finished saying to the Liz that it’s getting about as good as it’s going to get when Ollie fronted up at launch, strapped in and ready to go.

“Ed can you move your glider” Trent asked/demanded quite urgently.

“Is it on”?

“Mate, if Ollie’s taking off then it’s on. Let’s go.”

With that we got in line behind Ollie. Stuie jumped in in front of me at my invitation. It couldn’t hurt to watch a couple of good launches before mine.

Naah, you can go before me Stuie. Then I’ll get to see how the professionals do it”.

“If that’s what you want then you better not watch mine then”, Stuie jibed.

With no further fuss Trent then Stuie and then I were all in the air trying to catch Ollie. My goal was to do my first ever cross country flight however it wasn’t to be. After about an hour of scratching around the hill and missing a few opportunities I ended up landing. The best I’d gotten was about 500ft over launch however it was one of those “really good crappy flights”. It was really good because I did some things well and learnt a lot. I started with a well timed, good strong take off. I was finding the thermals reasonably well, infact, for most of the flight it felt like everyone was flying towards my thermal at a height way below me. One of the most satisfying aspects of the flight was the fact that many topless gliders that took off after me were on the deck long before me. I great confidence booster for a non-local in a Sonic. I did have a couple of opportunities that I squandered that I learnt’ from. The times when I did get high I didn’t use well. I should have made bolder moves once the thermals topped out, although my feeling was that the thermals were further over the back and I wasn’t prepared to look for them in the Sonic till I got that bit higher. I simply had no glide out if I was wrong - I’m not that ballsy yet. I never got that bit more height that I wanted to feel comfortable drifting further back. Eventually I landed and I was that keen to go again I deliberately landed at the top end of the bombout with the intention of carrying my gear back to the top to go again. It looks like it is only about 250m walk up the face of the hill. After landing I realised that it was only about 250m up but that it was going to be a lot of work for what would probably only be another sleddy. Just as I was making that decision Trent radioed in that “he and Ollie were 8000ft over Wangaratta” and that he was heading further west along the road to Tocumwal.

So after that Deb and Liz came up to help me pack up and carry the gear down to the car so we could go and get Trent. The radio calls just kept coming…

“This is Trent. I’m 20km west of Wang.”

“This is Trent. I’m over a huge lake on the Murray about 50km west of Wang.”

“This is Trent. The thermals are getting weaker. Don’t know how much longer I’ll be in the air for. I’m about 20km east of Tocumwal.”

“This is Trent. I’m over top of Tocumwal at 6000ft. I’m going in to land and give Tove a call.”

Deb (and all of us really) had been after a toilet since before Wangaratta, we eventually found one at a pub about half way from Wang to Toc. Other than that it was an uneventful trip out to Toc. We stopped in town at the Pub to get Trent his well earned congratulatory beers. By the time we arrived at the airfield Trent was half way through packing up his glider right beside the pool at Sportavia having a chat with Tove, who was looking very professional in her business suit, and her daughter Hanna. Tove invited us back to the newly built Heaney palace for a drink and nibblies. We arrived to see Grant and Thorry flying their remote control Zaggy’s. At times it appeared as though they were attempting to knock each others planes out of the sky … great fun. After a few hours of socialising with the Heaneys we left, promising to return for a weekend of flying. You see, after a season away from hangliding to recover from the whole Sportavia thing Grant and Tove, particularly Tove, were keen to get back into the flying. We left, waited half an hour in town for “the regions best hamburgers” to be made and then drove off. We got back to Bright spot on midnight.

To be continued…