Thursday 20th January Blind Optimism at Parham.

Despite all the evidence to the contrary, JB and I convinced ourselves that sheer willpower would prevail and that the actual conditions would be better than even the ever optimistic XC Weather had forecast, and so set of for Parham at 5am, dreaming about our first cross country of 2011. However, as we pulled into Southdowns Gliding Club in a little drizzle and equally little wind, those cross country dreams were dissolving fast, only to be revived partially by the arrival of Trevor Stuart from Nympsfield, the 3rd member of this desperate expedition, who hoped a Butser Hill - Lewes task would still be possible.We launched at around 11:30 onto the local ridge which was working well enough to maintain us at the meagre cloud base of about 900' and with the poor visibility we adopted the line astern formation with Trevor in his customary position at the head of the gaggle.

The wind varied between 9 and 14kts at flying height and with Trevor's guidance we managed to explore the 14km or so of ridge line between Amberly and Steyning. As the visibility improved and the cloud base rose, we took turns leading the group and all the time building our confidence in this exciting form of soaring.

Trevor and JB with their "Hot Ships" graciously did not attempt to cross the Steyning Gap onto Devils Dyke, as we couldn't get sufficient height for my Cirrus to comfortably make the leap, and the very soggy fields in the valley would have made for the mother of all retrieves if it all went wrong.

So not the spectacular trip we had dreamed about but very definitely well worth the effort.

A special THANK YOU to Will Greenwood who opened up the club, aero-towed us and then hung around to close up after we had de-rigged and left.

Golden Glow

JB preparing to scare the squirrels.