The weather observations for today looked good for The Pines and I was able to leave work early and was set up on the launch by 2pm. No one else around, but although it felt pretty light it was thermic so I pulled the wing up and ran off the hill. There was some light lift over the pine plantation, and I drifted around in it until I had located the core of the thermal and took it up to around 1,000m. Here I lost the core, and while searching for it fell completely out the back of the thermal and was heading down fast. I tried to fly back into it based on my flightpath on the Garmin GPS but couldn't seem to co-ordinate my flying with the track delay and wandered around in sink until I'd lost most of my height.
As the car was parked near the top of the hill I flew back towards launch with the intention of top landing. Unfortunately there was no lift close to the hill so I slope landed 50m or so below the takeoff – realising at the last moment that my chosen landing spot was covered in 5ft high thistles, rather than the dried grass that it looked like! It took a surprising amount of effort to extricate the wing and lines from the thistles, bunch it up and carry it back up to the launch.
By the time I arrived Ted (and students) were there (they had just returned from lunch in Beechworth after flying earlier on) however the wind was swinging around to the West and clouds had shaded out everything. I spent a while waiting for a sunny patch but it wasn't going to happen so I ended up launching for a sleddie down (and a lift back up).
The clouds looked really good to be flying under – dark, flat bottoms, with a nice but not scary amount of development. I can't help but think that if I had managed to take that first climb all the way up I could have spent several hours of happy cloud flying. Oh well, I guess there's always another day....
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Monday, March 24, 2008
Bright Easter Fly-in
The long Easter weekend is often near the end of the flying season and, for paraglider pilots in Victoria, it's also one of the biggest social get-togethers of the season. Often, like this weekend, the conditions are milder and more suitable for novices and the road up to launch has cars roaring up and down it all day. This Easter was very novice friendly - with clouds shutting down a lot of the lift and keeping conditions fairly quiet for most of the days. Still there were thermals, and I was happy to get a couple of satisfying flights in.
SATURDAY
I had to work in the morning and didn't make it to Bright until early afternoon - which was a pity as the sky looked just awesome on the drive to Bright but by the time I arrived large clouds were shading out the area for long periods of time. After a sleddie, I managed to climb out after a brief splash of sun on the slopes below launch and found cloudbase to be around 2,600m. I drifted around Bright for a bit before heading to Apex, where I experienced a new "first" of having a thermal lift up from under me and carry me into blue sky above the base of the surrounding clouds - and then misty feathers of cloud started to form around and under me. I flew away from the area as the cloud continued to mist into existence around me, snapping some pics and enjoying being on right on the scene for the birth of a new cloud. I headed towards Mt Porepunkah but lost a lot of height as I got close and ended up flying down the spur towards the Alpine Highway. Getting low, I recognised a mate's truck parked at a house below me and, seeing I couldn't find any lift, I landed in front of the house to say, "Hi!" It's always good to land where there is a ready retrieve....
SUNDAY afternoon, I launched and was bombing my way towards the landing paddock when I decided that conditions were right to try landing on the road on top of Marcus spur. I lined it up and floated along above the road (between the pine trees) and eventually landed as the road starts to slope up again. The key is (I think) to lose as much height as possible as far up the slope as possible. Otherwise you just float along above the road as it drops away down the ridge.
Second flight was much better - I waited with a couple of other pilots for a blue patch to bring some sunlight over and took a rough, surgey climb to base around 1,800m. From there over to clearspot, then down the ridge towards Little Buffalo, where BrianW flew over the top of me and I had to divert to Blackfellas for enough height to make it over the Porepunkah airfield (packed with sailplanes). I flew straight over Little Buffalo to the next ridge and found a very slow climb there that gradually firmed up as I got closer towards cloudbase. From there I followed the ridgeline towards Ovens, circling a bit here and there but not finding any good lift and eventually landing at Ovens. I was happy though, it feels like I'm getting better flights than I used to out of conditions with less potential. Pity winter is so close....
pics to come later
SATURDAY
I had to work in the morning and didn't make it to Bright until early afternoon - which was a pity as the sky looked just awesome on the drive to Bright but by the time I arrived large clouds were shading out the area for long periods of time. After a sleddie, I managed to climb out after a brief splash of sun on the slopes below launch and found cloudbase to be around 2,600m. I drifted around Bright for a bit before heading to Apex, where I experienced a new "first" of having a thermal lift up from under me and carry me into blue sky above the base of the surrounding clouds - and then misty feathers of cloud started to form around and under me. I flew away from the area as the cloud continued to mist into existence around me, snapping some pics and enjoying being on right on the scene for the birth of a new cloud. I headed towards Mt Porepunkah but lost a lot of height as I got close and ended up flying down the spur towards the Alpine Highway. Getting low, I recognised a mate's truck parked at a house below me and, seeing I couldn't find any lift, I landed in front of the house to say, "Hi!" It's always good to land where there is a ready retrieve....
SUNDAY afternoon, I launched and was bombing my way towards the landing paddock when I decided that conditions were right to try landing on the road on top of Marcus spur. I lined it up and floated along above the road (between the pine trees) and eventually landed as the road starts to slope up again. The key is (I think) to lose as much height as possible as far up the slope as possible. Otherwise you just float along above the road as it drops away down the ridge.
Second flight was much better - I waited with a couple of other pilots for a blue patch to bring some sunlight over and took a rough, surgey climb to base around 1,800m. From there over to clearspot, then down the ridge towards Little Buffalo, where BrianW flew over the top of me and I had to divert to Blackfellas for enough height to make it over the Porepunkah airfield (packed with sailplanes). I flew straight over Little Buffalo to the next ridge and found a very slow climb there that gradually firmed up as I got closer towards cloudbase. From there I followed the ridgeline towards Ovens, circling a bit here and there but not finding any good lift and eventually landing at Ovens. I was happy though, it feels like I'm getting better flights than I used to out of conditions with less potential. Pity winter is so close....
pics to come later
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