August 2008
Monthly Archive
Saturday, 9th August 2008
Judith 10 Aug 2008 | : Party, party, party...
Rain, rain, rain. We did house jobs and stripped Geoff’s HG down.
The LMSC demo day was rained off, but the BBQ still on, although it was moved indoors due to the inclement weather. It was a good turnout and a good craic. The glider club guys made us very welcome.
Forecast for next week is rubbish. We’d be going back to Spain if we were not having work done on the house.
Friday, 8th August 2008
Judith 08 Aug 2008 | : Archery, Flying
The forecast for today was for it to begin N but go round to the W during the day. By 10am it was a good sky and we toyed with the idea of going to Llangollen, but were not sure if we would turn up there just in time for it to go off, so we decided to second guess the weather and wait for the wind to turn and then go to the Mynd. We went to do some archery, and whilst we were shooting the sky became overcast. At 12.45pm we got a 3jam from Chairman Dave to say that it was flyable at Llangollen and 10 people were in the air. Graeme reported nil wind at Sarn, and Rich reported the same from the Long Mynd, so we decided to go to the Lawley. This was for a couple of reasons; it is often windier there than the surrounding hills and if the wind turned west we would have more options.
We got to the Lawley and it was very light. Too light to soar. Eventually it picked up a little and birds started thermalling, so I launched and managed to maintain, get low, scratch back up and land back at launch. A second go had me flying out to some swallows, but I didn’t connect properly and went down.
There is only one field which is not in high crop below the Lawley at the moment, and it was wet grass. My glider and harness got soaked packing up. We called in at the Long Mynd on the way home and there were a few hopefuls around. Liz S. said she had seen a forecast which promised 7mph W in the evening, but we went home anyway. 6.30pm we could see the trees starting to move in the garden, so we got our stuff together and got a phone call from Bill S. to say it was going to be soarable. It was flyable for about 45mins and Geoff and I flew for half an hour.
Thursday, 7th August 2008
Judith 07 Aug 2008 | : Archery, Flying
The forecast today was for showers from mid-afternoon, so we didn’t expect much. Actually, it was fine, so we stopped on the Long Mynd at 10am, but there was no wind at all, so we carried on and did some archery. By 11.30am we couldn’t bear the sight of the epic sky any more, so headed off back up the hill. Despite the lack of wind, there had to be opportunities to launch into thermals… or so we thought!
Once we got ready, what there was of the wind turned SW (sometimes S), the clouds built and there was no sun in the valley. We didn’t see one bird that wasn’t flapping and the sailplanes were doing pretty rubbish too. By 2pm it was raining behind us and there was rain to the south, so we decided to can it and go home to do something useful. Typically, as we got home we could see people flying and getting above ridge height. The clouds kept growing but there was little lift and the wind was picking up. At one point I was cutting the grass and thought it must be blown out.
Once it calmed down again we went out for an evening boat about, which was pleasant, but unfulfilling, given how good the sky had been earlier on. We had a nice beer with Michaela to end off the day.
Wednesday, 6th August 2008
Judith 07 Aug 2008 | : Boring stuff
Rubbish weather. We worked and played squash.
Tuesday, 5th August 2008
Judith 05 Aug 2008 | : Boring stuff
More atrocious weather! It’s like October, just marginally warmer. We spent the day working and editing the latest podcast, which is Flying 100km with Richard Westgate. Will be on the podcast page tomorrow morning.
Monday, 4th August 2008
Well, it was flyable, but not the good day we hoped for. Our expectations have gone down to getting one XC day per week – but we’re not even achieving that now with the increasingly bad weather.
Anyway, it started off flyable early for paragliders at the Long Mynd, even though the day was very cloudy – and it also rained, early on. The wind picked up for a while, too strong, then dropped off briefly around 2.00pm. We both launched paragliders, flew for about half an hour, the wind picked up again, and we both landed backwards, Judith at the bottom, me at the top. Hang gliders flew for much of the day (though none for a couple of hours in the afternoon, I think it was strong winds and rough). Mine needs work doing on it after the abortive flight on Sunday, and I didn’t fly it. I need to get it serviced properly, it’s been a few years.
The day did get nicer, i.e. the sun came out, but the wind didn’t drop enough for PGs until around 6.30 or so, though hang gliders were flying before that, and getting reasonably high. From then on there were a few hours of reasonable soaring left in the day for paragliders, and we both flew again.
Zero chance of going XC on a PG (and not that good on a hang glider). Great sky in the afternoon, but far too windy. Lots of wave. And too late, and no great height gains, by the time it dropped. Only one XC recorded in the PG league, in Cumbria.
See JulesBolero’s video of today.
Sunday, 3rd August 2008
A better day than expected. Basically, flyable all day at the Long Mynd, though for a few hours in the middle it was a bit strong for paragliders.
I started off flying the hang glider. As soon as I launched, I realised there was something wrong; big left turn, and pitching and diving constantly. I immediately flew out to the landing field – the emergency field, much bigger than the usual one – and managed to get it down more or less in one piece. On derigging, we realised the mylar in the left leading edge was folded over; packing it away the day before very sloppily had done that, and made it dangerous and unflyable. I was very relieved to get away with it. A very, very stupid thing to do.
We took the HG home, and went back up the hill. It was then flyable for PGs, but Judith was tired from the clubbing the night before, and didn’t fly. I flew the PG in very pleasant conditions for over an hour; landed as it was getting a bit stronger. Later, it dropped off again, and was flyable until late evening.
Monday looks like it’s possible for PGs. I need to check the HG over, and pull out and iron the mylar, which is probably very creased now, but I’ll leave that till later in the week, since, surprise, surprise, a lot of rain is forecast. Make the most of Monday!