Yes, 1600k is a long way to fly. But that was over four flights, not one. I spent nine days this month at the NSW country town of Cootamundra where my gliding club was holding its annual camp. We had good cross-country gliding weather with thermals up past 12,000 feet on some days.
I had four great cross-country flights of 420k, 444k, 346k and 400k. All very well, but I needed to fly 500 kilometres to get a Diamond Distance Badge – Bugger! Flying the 500k is more difficult than I realised. You have to fly efficiently to get around the task before the thermals die out at the end of the day. It can take seven hours of concentration to complete 500k and I was finding that my brain was giving up after about five hours. Maybe I’m just too old now!
5,800 feet leaving Narrandera on track to Gundagai in the DG303
The good thermal days are when it is really hot on the ground. It was up to 42 degrees one day which made it very fatiguing getting the glider ready for launch. Height was a blessing as the outside temp dropped to 10 degrees.
The club had four single-seat gliders and one two-seater to share between eight pilots. We also had up to five guys with their own private gliders. It was a lot of fun.
When the lift runs out you have to land in a farmer’s field. Luckily the west of NSW has lots of flat fields with the crops gathered in at this time of year. I made it back home on each of my flights but there were several outlandings. I helped with a couple.
The drill is to drive the glider’s trailer into the field then take the glider apart and slot it into the trailer. It can be done quickly (45 minutes) with a good crew. Of course you then have to put it back together at the airfield!
Several of the pilots managed badge flights of 300k and 500k.
I put my flights up on a website – the On Line Contest . This allows you to compare your performance with other pilots from around the world. You can see my flights here – click on Info for a map. For a time, one of my flights was the best in the world! That was mainly because in NSW our gliding day finishes before the rest of the country and before the other southern hemisphere gliding spot such as Southern Africa. I was soon overtaken, but it was good while it lasted.
Now I’m back home I’ll have to knuckle down and produce another Journal for the gliding club. There should be plenty of material from the camp but I have to persuade the pilots to write about their experiences.
At the camp I flew a few of the local people on air experience flights in the two-seater. That was interesting work and free flying for me!
