{"id":363,"date":"2009-02-24T19:53:32","date_gmt":"2009-02-24T18:53:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/?p=363"},"modified":"2009-02-25T18:52:51","modified_gmt":"2009-02-25T17:52:51","slug":"tuesday-24th-february-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/?p=363","title":{"rendered":"Tuesday, 24th February 2009"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ValThe forecast was great and we headed out to Santa Brigida<\/a> with great excitement. Clouds were good, it was south and there was a bunch of us there. Lluis launched first and sunk out, only to get a heroic low save which took him really, really high. We took off and flew out into the valley ahead. I was starting to think that I am not actually flying the glider very well, as I was having trouble centering the glider in the thermals. I decided that I would fly for at least an hour before top-landing, so pootled about trying to work out the thermals a little better.<\/p>\n

Geoff and I went out to a cloud together and on the way back I managed to get a good thermal which I took to 2300′ ATO (about 300′ below cloud base). It’s the highest I’ve been over Santa Brigida<\/a>. So off I headed towards Olot<\/a>. It’s uphill all the way until you get into the Val d’en Bas, so you need to get a lot of height to try it.<\/p>\n

I lost the thermal on the way to Les Planes des Hostoles and crossed the tree covered ridge in big sink. Unlike the last time I was in this valley, I managed to get on to the other side and dropped onto the hill before the castle. I forced myself to be patient and after 5 minutes soaring it found the thermal I was hoping for. As I was winding out, I saw Geoff in the distance. Unfortunately he didn’t have the height to make it over the ridge, so had to turn back to the last available landing field.<\/p>\n

I got back up to 2200′ ATO and thermalled over St Feliu de Pallerols. Then it was decision time – along the road or cross the ridge into the Val d’en Bas. The road leads to high ridges and it was after 4pm by this time, so I chose the lower pass over the Rupit<\/a> road. I cleared the ridge and then looked around for the next thermal source. The valley wind was strong and I found a thermal on the leeside of the ridge I had just crossed. I was low at this point and the thermal was not properly formed and being blown along the ground fast. I managed to hang on to it past Els Hostalets but was down by St Esteve d’en Bas. I was hugely pleased. Best height gain and longest flight from Santa Brigida<\/a> to date. Not very far, but immensely satisfying.<\/p>\n

And I got chatted up by a trucker. What is it about men and big rucksacks?<\/p>\n

The track log is on our XC page<\/a> (the first XC for 2009, so it’s a bit empty at the moment! Opens in a new window).<\/p>\n

Geoff writes:<\/strong> it was a good day. I launched first, made it out to the cliff in front again. Went back, met up with Judith, went out front…. finally we left over the back, Judith first, me in a later thermal. I messed up the first thermal a little, and didn’t get to cloud base, so didn’t have enough height to get over a ridge a few kilometers behind, so had to land. But a lot of fun, and Judith flew really well.<\/p>\n

See photos of today.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The forecast was great and we headed out to Santa Brigida with great excitement. Clouds were good, it was south and there was a bunch of us there. Lluis launched first and sunk out, only to get a heroic low save which took him really, really high. We took off and flew out into the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.judithmole.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}