Flight

Turned up at 9am to find that getting to cloudbase was a matter of reaching up with one hand to touch it. After that, it got better. What with the weather actually allowing flying, and it being a weekend and all that, the Southern hordes were milling around take off. Crazy stuff, until the first decent thermal of the day saw me and Paul Watts climbing out together in a 3.5 up. Turned on the GPS, and away we we went - to about 2500ft, where it suddenly got much more difficult. Still, the drift was good, even if the thermal had petered out. Paul went off, and I followed, getting lower, with only a few desultory bumps to give me any hope. Saw Paul going up just north of ASDA, and glided underneath him, very low. Never been here before, in the lee of the hill; not a good place to be. Paul fled, only to land shortly afterwards. Shame. I chose my landing spot, and started turning into wind, only to be hoiked up a few feet, just in front of the trees.  Then over the trees (ooh, er, no, please, let me down!). Classic thermal trigger, these trees, and boy, were they triggering. It was rough as ****, but got me out of there, then wafted over Lewes, to a thermal over the cliffs, marked by gulls. Gulls lie. They said it was smooth, but it was rough as ***** again, so wandered over Caburn (Do I win the Flybabble challenge?) and glynded to Glide. Or something similar. Landed vertically in rough ground; walked out through enormous field of neck-high stinging nettles (at least something's growing this year), and train and bus back.