A strange sight greeted us this morning, what seemed like big seagulls suspended off the ground, they were in fact White Storks! And lots of them, estimated to be around 40, a bit later they all took off and formed a “big muster” and skillfully worked a thermal before heading off towards the coast.
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| A big muster of Storks thermalling over North Hill (Simon Leeson) |
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| Some of the Storks landed on the airfield (Simon Leeson) |
The forecast was very good but it didn’t turn out as advertised, however a reasonable amount of club members were present and it turned out to be a very enjoyable day.
The long list of pilots, but thankfully we had the instructors to cope, Stu Procter was main man, aided by Simon Leeson, Mark Courtney and James Flory. Tom Sides looked after the Trial lesson visitors, the first was Joanne wearing our new wrist band to secure smartphones during flight, she loved the experience, the flight as well as the wrist band!
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| Trial lesson visitor Jo Forkan with Tom, modelling the new wriststrap (Mark Courtney) |
We did miss the DG505 however which is away being flown in the Two-seater competition at Pocklington, Connor Williams and Shaun Dayman are being coached by a very experienced competition pilot, good luck guys!
We were soon working through the flying list, the skies were grey and it felt a bit like early October! however that didn’t dampen people’s spirits.
Joel Roulson was put through his paces by Simon, getting him prepared for the next rung on the ladder, his bronze test, “he flew very well” according to Simon.
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| Well done to Stuart Thomson - converting to Junior (Andy Batchelor) |
Well done to Stuart Thomson who converted to the Junior, Lisa Humphries who was back in the Junior (and then in the winch retraining with Hans Jenssen) and Chris Warnes for completing his IFP revalidation checks with Stuart Procter.
In the Briefing Room, it was well done to Ashley Thomas and Mike Meatyard who both passed their Bronze theory exams supervised by Pete Harmer.
Graham and Cheryl are now enjoying their new freedom from the toil of working in the kitchen, sat outside the clubhouse they chatted to visitors.
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| Graham showing off his appropriately designed mug (Mark Courtney) |
Richard Roberts flew two friends and family in the Perkoz towards the end of the day, keeping the tug busy till the very end of play. It was lovely to see Ella and her brother again, she will be with us until her university course starts in September in Newcastle and hopes to be back during the Uni holidays.
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| End of a long day (Mark Courtney) |
We managed to get through the very long list, however I must emphasise that this was only possible because of the hard work everyone put in. I think a special mention should go to the Junior members today, Ella Penny and her brother Alex, Arthur Hier, Joel Roulson and George Lee, they worked tirelessly retrieving gliders, hooking on and everything in between, I would also like to mention Andy Batchelor who organised everyone from the start of play, I did hear him say he was looking forward to work on Monday for a rest!
Thanks to everyone else that made the day a success (fathers David Hier, Ivan Roulson and Grandfather Robert Lee), it really was a huge team effort. - (ed mashup) Lisa Humphries and Mark Courtney (50th time blogger - and doesn't know the difference between Cranes and Storks! - Sorry Jonathan no Ciceronian triplets and no split infinitive, I’ll try and do better next time.)
