Glencoe Friday 1st May

Hi All,

Bob Mathews and I, after a cup of tea and a bacon roll in the cafe at the bottom of the hill, headed up the ski lift and joined 40 or so pilots on the lower slopes of Meall a Bhuiridh, noted that Derek and Dorita had also made it so it was a small show from Wingbeat. Thing was it was already 11:30 and no activity with one pilot going off early on a straight TTB, what was going on it was supposed to be a 5 star day. Not only that it had gone Easterly so was quite cross hill. Anyway it was a good time to have a little socialising and a catch up with others. There was quite a large contingent from north of England who came and were all quite expectant.

 

30 to 45 mins later things did start kick off and folk then showed a little urgency to get away and unfortunately all pretty well bombed except for the elete who seemed to be able to climb in zero's (how do they do that?). So with a lot of the top guys on the deck, it seemed to be a bit of a waiting game. Bob was away before I got my glider out the bag and within 15 mins I was off after him. My first thoughts after getting the feet in the pod with lots of sink was "Oh B**ger I've chosen the wrong time to launch, but after a while of hugging the cliff face and managed to connect into lift and steadily started to climb eventually I got out above Buachaille Etive Mor to about 5.8 grand, and had some wonderfull views all round. I have to admit I was gob smacked with all the fantastic scenery, I could see hills for hundreds of miles.

 

Anyway I perservered trying to gain more height then sank out big sytle loosing a grand in seconds, got into a climb again and when that petered out I made my move the plan was first to get to Oban then perhaps head off left or right whatever felt right. So sitting a grand or so above the Buachaille I headed down Glen Etive where the sky was starting to open up and put sun on the ground so sunny patches was where I was going. On 3/4 bar it seemed to take an age to get to and above Stob Dubh a hill on the right of the glen split apart from others so headed to it's south face and immediately got the second climb that disappeared at 5 grand so my next target was the sunny face of Beinn a Bruridh 5 kms away. This was great flying, and I was on my way to the coast.

 

Anway that was the beginning of the end as I made the transition I hit a major sink hole and really bitty knarly small climbs that put me on the ground at the bottom of my target hill at the head of Loch Etive. At one stage my intruments recorded 14 mph ground speed in all directions how bizarre! I'm still trying to work it out, but something Dudley said to me on our last trip to the Coe, that there is regular convergence, and I think it was the sea breeze that came from the West coast and I ran head on into it (Does that make sense?). I Had a retieve straight away from a couple walkers and got back at Glencoe ski centre for about 4ish. With no Bob to be seen, I later heard he had a great day. Flying to Connel (Nr Oban) then turning for the Ben landing in Fort Bill where I retrieved him.

 

On reflection it was not an easy day given its 5 star rating there was totally cloud cover by the time we had walked up, and from then on it wasn't going to be easy, this was shown as at least 50% of those on the hill landed at the ski centre or in various areas of Rannoch Moor. Base was varied from area to area 6,400 to 7,200 feet.

 

I have been a bit cheeky for photographs of the day and since I didn't get any photography I've pinched some that actually come from Graham Saunders, who is a much better photographer than me. 

 

A fantastic day out, that blew me away with it's superb views.