It was hoped that the showery convergence originating in the Irish Sea would stay to the west of North Hill, but the High pressure had just moved slightly and there was quite a lot of unusable cloud. The wind was northerly and once again the solo flying list had to be limited to the more experienced pilots. The list for training and check flights progressed with Tuggie Mark helping out Pete and Peter with the 3 two-seaters available. (Thanks to Ian for completing the Annual and the Wednesday crew for rigging HCX).
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| Stopped for lunch for everyone to warm up (Dave Clements) |
For about an hour, there was an opportunity for some extended flights with Nigel Everett in LRD managing the longest flight of 18mins using the North ridge and managing to get back.
After lunch, there was more of the same with a short hail shower just before the cloud disappeared back to the west. Unfortunately the wind conditions got worse, the crosswind picked up and increased gusts made an easy decision to pack up early, sorry a few missed out on flying.
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| Clear skies eventually (Jill Harmer) |
In the evening, there was news that some of the expedition to Parham had arrived and made it to the pub - hoping for a good day on the South Downs tomorrow.
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| The advance party (Matt Williamson) |
Day 7 - Road Trip to Poland and back
After a long
day yesterday we allowed ourselves a slightly later start this morning
and over breakfast in the hotel we looked at the various routes to
Dunkirk.
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| Snow on most routes (Mike Sloggett) |
The
routes were all very similar in terms of distance and travel time so we
decided that we would add Holland to the ‘countries visited’ list and
planned our route accordingly - snow of varying degrees was being
forecast for various parts of West Europe and we were aware that the UK
was forecast to have snow down the East coast which might well make it
across to Europe.
A
light snow shower had started as we left the Hotel car park and for the
first 150 miles or so we drove through countryside where snow had
either happened already or was steadily falling as we drove along the
autobahns of Germany.
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| Still going (Mike Sloggett) |
We
continued our journey steadily but surely through Germany into Holland,
Belgium and finally France with the kilometres travelled increasing all
the time - by the time we arrived in Dunkirk late evening the distance
driven to date from North Hill to Poland and back is just over 2100
miles, across five different European countries!
And
tomorrow we catch the ferry back to the UK early afternoon heading for
London Gliding Club at Dunstable to return their now shiny K21. - Mike Sloggett
