Jamie -> Carrie : may be a chance of a tandem flight sunday afternoon or monday evening.
Jamie -> Carrie : all weather dependant of course.
Jamie -> Carrie : Forecasts change day on day so it's only ever a rough guess
Jamie -> Carrie : when you look 4 or 5 days ahead.
Carrie -> Jamie : That would be wicked
I wish it was that easy every time to get a tandem passenger sorted out. Maybe it is and I'm just not trying hard enough!
So... Sunday looked flyable. Possibly a tad strong in the morning but that was fine by me as I was taking the kids ski / snowboarding ( and I was getting to play too) first thing.
Direction. West-ish. Several options depending if things were north or south of west by the time we were ready to go.
Carrie headed round to Lockerbie for 13.30 and we were off. The drive north to Broughton was a bit interesting at times. Sheep racing at Moffat and several rain showers but we continued on.
Steve, Quentin and Will had been flying from 11ish but had landed to avoid the showers. We spotted people in the air as we drove up after Broughton village so was looking promising.
We took our time walking up. Not sure Carrie was used to walking up hills. I think the relative quiet spooked her. It's never quiet in London! When we got to the top of the track we spotted Ged flying down. He landed near us but then took off again and flew down tot he car. Something about a 4x4 heading up in an hour. Doh! We missed that!
We then walked up towards the weather station. Dave and Marco had a wee tandem flight, slope landing just below where we were.A nice but short flight.
I think seeing the tandem fly gave Carrie a wee bit more enthusiasm for the walk up. Well maybe!
We set up in front of the cross. The first launch didn't go to plan but second went better (launch assist by Steve). It was pretty light but we had a few lift indicators (Ged, Will and Quentin) at times so I could see where was working and where was not. At one point I suggested we were going to top land - in part as we were close to soaring down the hill only to be told "NO. I don't want to land!"
Ok I thought... I'll keep going. Luckily it was lifting quite nicely and we worked things and probably maxing out 30ft or so above where we took off. I think Carrie was a bit nervous about getting off without a launch assistant (We would have been fine..)
25 min or so of scratching and soaring I was starting to feel it in my arms. So we decided to fly down. I think we may have flown over Dave and Marco walking down - they had a second flight but didn't quite manage to get into the lift band so it was more of an extended fly down round the bowl.
A few wing unders when we had a bit of height then cruised in and landed.
33min or there abouts. Carrie didn't look hugely excited about but said she loved it.Ii mentioned it might be flyable the following night and would Kris her husband like a shot. No chance was the response - you'll be flying me in stead. Kris can stay with the kids!
So I guess she liked it. :-)
Jamie
Pictures:
Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9VPvB5g2BY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9VPvB5g2BY&feature=youtu.be
