Sunday series - Task 9 April 08

Sunday 13th of April
(For Briano)

Quite a big turnout on the hill at Mt Tamborine. I went out with Joel and got a lift up the hill with Flocky. A few guys were there that hadn't flown much lately like Ziggy and Warwick. There weren't many clouds and no-one was too enthused to launch in the light shifting Westerly breezes. I think Flocky was first off and got low near the bombout. Then he found a slow climb and Big Jon was off under him. Everyone got in their gliders then and lined up. There were two main groups off on the task to Rathdowney then Model.

I ended up in the second group and after a long wait to get off I found some light lift to the left of launch. Only 50up. I persisted and drifted back a bit and then it was 250fpm up. Finally after a lot of shifting it turned into 400fpm up and soon I was at 4,000ft and off to Misery.

I met up with Paul A (Rowdy) & someone else on Misery . Paul headed straight West to Chicken shed ridge and seemed to not be loosing too much height. But I decided the clouds looked better over Witheren. So I headed off South and about 2km in front of Witheren found a 500fpm up from a fire near the Chicken Sheds in the Kerry Valley. This was great and I headed off down the Kerry, but found nothing else and I was setting up to land with someone else at the Kerry turnpoint when I found some light lift. I persisted with this for quite some time it was only 100fpm up. Then left it at 2,200ft and headed more south and found some more light lift. I edged closer to the Jinbroken range and the lift improved a bit and I got to 3,500ft and was able to get over the range, but a massive cloud had formed over Tamrookum area and blocked out the sun where I was headed. I then ended up landing about 13km short of Rathdowney which was the first turnpoint. This got me to about 8th position for the day with Neil first Warren second and Ronald third. I was about 30km from the start and Neil made about 43km. Well done Neil.

Now about Joel. Joel wrecked his knee kiteboarding a while back and it was just getting better until Joel landed in the bombout. He landed ok, but put his bad leg down first which stuffed it again. Poor bugger. Then because Warrens car was full, I had no one to pick me up. So Joel drove my car out to get me with a very sore knee. Thanks buddy. Really appreciated it.

Hang gliding, Bike ride and Storm March 08

Sat 15th of March found us on Beechmont launch. Gary, Rangi and myself launched around 10.30am into an nice ENE breeze of around 18knts. Cloud base was low at around 3,500ft. After about 20 mins we all got up high enough to head West. Rangi chose Gordos and Gary and I went to Hinchchliffs. I had a good line and easily made it to cloud base over Beaudesert, but found nothing under it and decked it just south of Beaudesert. Gary landed in the Kerry and Rangi made it to the base of range past Mt Walker. Good effort Rangi. Although it took us ages to find him. Not all roads on your gps exist. Here are some pics heading away from Beechmont.

On Good Friday I took my Suzuki SV650s for a ride. I went over Tambo to Beaudesert, to Rathdowney. Then over the range via Lions Rd. Then to Kyogle, Uki, Murwillumbah to Natural arch and around Hinze dam to home. There is a great cafe in Uki that makes excellent smoothies. About 350km and a good ride. Here is a pic taken just before getting to the border. I did get a little wet.

The train tunnel Lions Rd.

On Wed 26th of March there were some great storm cells in the evening which made the sky really spectacular. Here are a couple of pics.