We really wanted a day off today. Really. The forecast said there would be high cloud and getting worse later, so we blew out Oriol and Johnny. It looked cloudy at the coast, so we decided against the beach and settled down to work. Then the forecast changed to sunny in the afternoon and worse for tomorrow and Sunday. We spoke to Johnny again and he persuaded us to come out and play and bring the Hook for him to test fly. There’s only so much arm twisting we can take…

We met up with Johnny and John at Sant Pere de Rodes and it seemed not too windy. On top we noted that cloudbase was actually below us, but further away. I launched first (on my new glider!) and scratched along the front. Considering the sunshine it was surprisingly lacking in thermals, but given that we are back in the UK in a couple of weeks, I need the scratching practice. Eventually I sunk to the level of the church, which is normally the height you need to consider going out to the landing field. Johnny came over to join me in my little scratch pad and considering he flies without a vario, did an astonishingly good job of staying up. I eventually got high enough to cross back to the main ridge, where Geoff was happily soaring above ridge height. Johnny fought it out too and managed to join us soaring over the ruin.

Within about 15 minutes the sky had completely changed. It was like someone turned the lights off. The front came in and sea fog/low cloud came rolling in and the ridges to the east and west of us started to be clouded in. Geoff and I were not on radio, but simultaneously decided it was time to head out for the landing field. Both of us had spotted the increasing wind and the lifty conditions and did not want to risk being above orographic cloud.

I did land coming down fairly vertically, but nothing dramatic. We didn’t see another spec of sunshine until the spectacular sunset on the way home.

See photos of today.

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