Nick's Airtime '09

[Nick Roberts]

Some nice mellow flying at Heol Senni.  I'd almost forgotten what a sunny day was like!  A good midweek turnout and a few new faces.  I'd have liked to have been there a couple of hours earlier but 15:30 was a major effort(work got in the  way).   The wind seemed to have picked in the evening. Hope it's not too windy for tomorrow! 

 

[Nick Roberts]

17/08/09 - Rhossili

It seemed rather breezy as I drove down after work and I was expecting a beach launch but upon arrival, people were busy launching and landing on the Pimple and the air was full of midweek-fliers with some small fluffy clouds above - great stuff! .


Airtime '09 - 108hours

[Nick Roberts]

13/08/09 - Rhossili

A beautiful day.  Arrived at 16:00 to find the breeze a little brisk but manageable on the pimple.  The liftband was enormous and amazing height gains were enjoyed by a good crowd of midweek fliers - Stevie G and Chris W, Paul H, Paul W, Viv, Cookie, the Fly West Wales Crew and their friends and a lone hanglider pilot.
Good to see Gron and Gareth P in the evening too.  The wind didn't ease in the evening though - it got stronger! so we retired to the pub at about 20:00 for a foaming pint of Worms |Head Ale mmmm!   

[Nick Roberts]

11/08/09 - Lletty Siac

Sky looked quite good and with the wind expected to pick up at Rhossili,  I thought I'd join Steve J up at Lletty Siac - a site I haven't flown since ...ahem.. July 27th 2007! 

Arrived 14:30 to see Steve in the air.  The wind seemed a tad strong so I thought I wouldn't go over the back, instead just enjoy the change of scenery..maybe take some pics.  The scenery was fine but in the air, a gusty horribleness made its presence felt so I decided to land after a mere twenty minutes.  Safely on the ground, I watched Steve disappear downwind.

 "A lovely day though" thought I after a leisurely pack up and walk back to the car where I discovered that I did not have my phone     so I spent the next hour retracing my steps eventually finding the phone on the takeoff area.  Back at the car again, Steve appeared having luckily met Rhun who happened to be passing through the Neath valley so everything AOK.

[Nick Roberts]

Merthyr - The sky looked good on approach at 14:00 but then I saw the gliders lined up on the takeoff - no wind!

Then, after a bit pf chatting and parawaiting -  as if by magic, the wind switched on in dramatic fashion.  Not much lift for a while(except for the first pilot off who disappeared).  A short while later, some rather ratty thermals started to make their presence felt and we were on our way to cloudbase at 4000'.  Not wanting to join Chris and Andy the Pole in the white room,  I booted off towards the next cloud which seemed to work well and after a good glide, I made another transition but stopped to top up in a weak climb. It was then that I  noticed Chris passing below and then doubling back underneath and I thought he was going down and there wasn't much of athermal below so I headed off towards the next clouds and some likely looking ground sources beckoning in the sun.  Alas, despite some good indications, I sank to the deck on the common behind Abertysswg.  Then I looked to the southeast and spotted chris wafting along up high...........

So there I was by the side of the road thinking aah! how the heck do I get back from here.  Two generous lifts later followed by a lift back to the hill from Rhymney with Norris and I'm back at the car chatting with Andy the Pole and Norris, then it's time to go and look for Chris but on the way down, Chris passes me in Edy Geczy's Landrover -  result or what! 

[Nick Roberts]

August 6th - Rhossili

A fine afternoon's flying with light conditions to begin with, becoming very lifty as the breeze picked up then into the evening it got a bit too strong.  Great to see  so many pilots in the air(too many to name!) and spectators on the ground.  The Fly West Wales team and the Joint Services were in full swing and  the Acro displays from Stevie G and Co were interesting and entertaining! 

Many thanks to Sarah and her colleague from the National Trust for coming up and trimming back the gorse in front of takeoff for us.

Pint  and a chat in the pub afterwards - Iechyd da!

[Nick Roberts]

Nice evening flight at Nant y Moel.  Always good to chat to the SEW crowd.  Good to see Viv soaring and top-landing.  Missed the XC action  though - had to wait in for the Gas man to come round and condemn my gas boiler - hey ho!   :mrgreen:

[Nick Roberts]

Went to Nant y Moel early.  Only James, Mark, Jeremy and a few others there.  Got up to cloudbase at 3500' quite quickly in rather ratty conditions and decided to go over the back.  There wasn't much sun downwind so I decided to soar along the valley above Treorchy and wait for conditions to improve and give me a decent climb.  I flew back and fore for an hour in small broken thermals but all the while, the wind was getting a bit strong and I could see that pilots back at Nanty had all landed.  I had also been picking up conversations on the radio from Norris and co flying at Merthyr and I heard someone reporting 27mph on the ground and I thought "hmmm......maybe I'll go and land..and fly another day"

[Nick Roberts]

Bryncaws - 28/06/09

I wasn't sure about the weather yesterday but people and pilots  seemed to congregate at Bryncaws in the afternoon so I thought I'd better join them.
Arrived at around 13:00 to see a few in the air but the sky didn't look too promising.  By the time I'd launched, most seemed to have landed for a natter.  I soon found out why - it was pretty bumpy with the wind increasing and decreasing and flicking between southeast and south.  I didn't fly for long and with gloom and rain moving in from the southeast during the latter half of the afternoon,it was time to pack away.  Chris went XC though...trying to get to better looking sky further north........don't worry Chris -Tal y bont wasn't much kop either by the sound of it!

[Nick Roberts]

Fan G - The weather brightened during the afternoon and the Met Office said light southwesterly so I headed up to Fan G with Viv and met  up with Nick Winder in the layby.  The cloud drift was SSE so not good but we went up for a look anyway.  The wind was light on top but some thermic cycles were coming up the southwest face so we decided to give it a go.  Launching at 17:30 the air was quite smooth which made a nice change to what we have experienced here of late.
 One climb took me to 600'a.t.o. but apart from that it was just a mellow evening fly.   

[Nick Roberts]

Abernant - Arrived late afternoon to find Viv, Gerry and Francois up on the takeoff.  They had just landed and it seemed rather strong to me.  We sat around for a while and conditions seemed to mellow after 17:00.  At 17:30, I could see some seagulls going up so I launched and found myself in a nice thermal straightaway which turned into cracking climb almost to cloudbase at 4800' a.m.s.l.

I'm sure I could have made a nice XC but Gerry and Francois had packed up and gone and I was reluctant to leave Viv flying alone on the hill so I flew a small triangle  which might have been bigger but for a large area of cloud spreadout that  put everything in the shade but I made it back to the hill to soar for a while.

 

[Nick Roberts]

Llanddewi Brefi - Headed out west today - First stop at Nick Winder's place in Llansadwrn where I help Nick to repack and fit his reserve into his new harness and then after some skywatching and a ring around, we headed over to Llanddewi
Brefi and hoped for the best.  On arrival, we found  very little wind and a few spots of drizzle but we were too far away to try anywhere else so we sat in the field and ate lunch.  A while later, local pilots John and Alex turned up, a little breeze came on which was enough for a prolongued groundhandling session(good for Nick and his new secondhand Epsilon 5). 

A while later, Dave Birch arrived and by then, there was enough wind to launch and buzzards and Red Kites pointed the way to some weak thermals which were usable and after a short while, I found myself at 1200' a.t.o. in completely overcast conditions!

A while later still, the lift had died away and we toplanded quite pleased with our little bonus, then the wind came on again at around 17:00 and we all launched into buoyant conditions climbing up to the cloudbase which had lowered to 2000' !
It was a good waftabout until about 18:00 when the lift finally died away and we packed up.

So... no sun for our Summer Solstice Flight but nice flying nonetheless at this splendid flying site!   

[Nick Roberts]

16/06/09 - Nant y Moel - Arrived mid afternoon after work to find sea air had infiltrated which was strong and off to the south so parawaited for a while with Andy, Viv and a few SEW regulars.  The wind dropped to light for a while but then picked up again.  A short flight confirmed that the wind was still off the hill high up too!

After some more parawaiting and deliberating whether to pack up and go to Cwmafan, lo and behold,the famous Nanty restitution came on just as a steady stream of evening flyers turned up and everybody had a good flyabout including a group of Paraventure students - a good social fly!   

[Nick Roberts]

15/06/09 - Rhossili for an evening flight - light conditions but a nice mellow flight in the evening sun with enormous cu-nims inland to the north - the Gower Microclimate shines through!  Good to see Paul Hyde out on the hill.  A pint of Worms Head Ale  with Paul ,Stevie G and Viv out on the balcony later in the setting sun - there's no better place to be!   

[Nick Roberts]

Thanks to Dave and Idris for the video - a great day over the Welsh Countryside!

Sunday 14/06  - Nant Y Moel (ahem - shouldv'e been here yesterday too!).  Anyway, got there early to find a model aircraft competition taking place and this together with concern that the wind may veer to the west saw us deliberating on whether to decamp to Merthyr but then Ivor turned up and marched over to the takeoff area for some groundhandling and promptly took off! - Hats Off to the guy and great to see him back on the hill.

  A few others took off followed by Andy, Viv and myself.  Conditions were pretty choppy and I decided to go over the back at the first opportunity which was not long in coming after a series of broken climbs saw me at 3000' and drifting away.
Patience was required at the back of the next valley to get high enough for the transition to Mountain Ash and then to the south end of the Merthyr ridge.  Minced around here for a while at height waiting for the sky to open up behind(there was rather too much cloud).  Eventually glided off towards the south end of Abertysswg
where I thought I was going to get up but didn't quite and got stuck for a good while eventually getting a climbout  to the north of the quarry.  From here, I had an easy ride along the sunny edge of a large cloudmass past Blaenavon and out into the flatlands towards Usk(I could hear Norris and Pete on the radio having a good time somewhere - Merthyr maybe?).  I wanted to head more to the northeast but felt compelled to follow an active cloudline skirting around a large blue hole, a tactic that worked well for a while before running out of steam leaving me with a final glide to a farm just short of Monmouth.
My longest U.K. flight of the year so far in distance and duration( 63.8km in 3hrs 55mins)
Very satisfying indeed!   

Many thanks to Viv for the retrieve(we picked up Andy on the way back too!)
A great day - let's be 'avin some more!