| Flight details: | I confess I was anxious driving down to the Dyke because I'd told myself this was going to be the day of my first "proper" UK open distance XC. Not sure exactly what I was anxious about - getting lost, crash landing, using radio for the first time, hassle getting back, bombing without going anywhere - all of that.
I arrived just before 09:00, rigged, tested my radio and stood around a bit calming my nerves. Luke, Taka, Cookie, Paul Harvey and Dave Matthews all went off pretty much together and I could see them high over Truleigh and crossing the Steyning Gap as I took off. The wind had dropped a bit and there was not much ridge lift. I crossed the power lines on the way to Truleigh only 100ft or so above them and arrived at Truleigh not very high.
Darren had said not to underestimate how much height I would need to jump the Steyning Gap, and to try to get to cloudbase, or above 4,000ft before heading across, unless it looked like I had a climb on the way over. A couple of times I got good climbs over Truleigh that I lost at about 2,700ft, and then lost 1,000ft or so getting back to the front to try to find another thermal. After what seemed like a long, long time, I eventually took a climb to 3,800ft, probably about 200ft short of cloudbase but as close as I wanted to get. With that I headed west over the Gap, finding a bit of lift on the way and passing well over the top of the far north edge of the Shoreham airspace, so that I arrived at the other side still at about 2,500ft.
I could hear the other guys helping each other on the radio but, interesting as it was, none of it was much help to me, about 10 or 20km behind them.
The next big gap was over the A29 at Bury! Again it took me a few attempts to get to just below cloudbase, now a bit higher at just over 4,000ft. The first time I've been above 4,000ft in the UK. That took me comfortably over the next gap and I got back in front of the ridge with loads of height to spare. At the next big |
