Tamborine to Boonah T flight - Sun May 4

A Google Earth image of my flight path.

Another beautiful winters day on the Coast led Joel and myself on a days hang gliding trip. We arrived on launch to find quite a few Hang Gliders and Paragliders there setting up. Dan, Scotty 1 & 2, Rod, Derek, Pete and more were there, plus many spectators who clapped after each person launched. Which was unusual but good. Conditions were very light and a few ended up in the Bomb out field. So we waited until nearly 1pm before launching. I got off ok in the light winds and found myself in a very light thermal with plenty of others just out in front of launch. Some people were getting too close for my liking so I left the thermal and came back in under everyone. Eventually I climbed to around 5,500ft near launch. The paragliders went more south towards misery and all got low.

I headed out with Briano and Dan towards Chicken shed ridge which worked well for us. We got to Beaudesert at around 5,000ft then Briano headed W/NW of Beaudesert and Dan and myself headed out to the West and got a good climb near the quarry. I saw some good clouds a bit more W/SW and Dan headed a bit more W/NW. There was also a fire where I was headed and I found a good climb there. Dan got low and headed back closer to where I was. I waited for him to climb back up to me so we could continue flying together, but after nearly half an hour I began getting very cold and started shivvering and my fingers were getting numb. So I headed out to the Boonah T. I got there at 2,500ft and began to warm up again, but the clouds had all gone, it was about 3pm by then.

So I found a light thermal and just flew around enjoying the view and afternoon sun. There was not much wind and I decided not to land at the Boonah T as the field seemed to slope down with direction I was going to land. So instead I found a nice uphill field to South West of Boonah T and landed safely there. 46km all up for the day. Several times at cloud base. Some nice long glides. I was a happy Chappy.

Don and Rod came to pick me up just after I'd finished packing up which was great. Thanks guys. Dan did get back up, flew to Boonah T and headed back to Beaudesert, but landed a few Kms East of Boonah T.

Joel was going to launch just after me, but it was so light that he would have had to run really fast and with his wrecked knee he chose to wait until more wind was coming up the face. So by the time he got off the hill I was already gone. He bombed out with Scott and Karl and managed to get a ride up the top again to pick up my car. He then had to wait for me to get back from my flight. Thanks buddy. I didn't get back to Canungra till 5.20pm.

So not such a great day for poor Joel, but I had a grin from ear to ear.