| Flight details: | Managed to exchange a day at the Canal Walk shopping centre (think Bluewater in 35 degrees...) for a flying day at Porterville. Met my wife's cousin at the Dasklip Pass launch with Richard Masters from SHGC and Tom - one of the local guides. He and Richard launched early and showed that even by 10am the thermals were already working well though conditions different from last time with a bit of N in the wind. After seeing them climb strongly in front of take off I set-up and launched straight into a thermal (before I'd even got in the pod) that took me to 1400m. Waited around for Cornel but eventually headed off to follow a few other guys who'd come past from Pampoenfontain (turned out Cornel thought it was picking up and talked himself out of launching - I've done it before, can sympathise totally as this game is as much psychological as anything else).
This time conditions felt very different to the previous flight. As I worked my way along the ridge top every thermal felt small and very gnarly (partly my crap thermalling technique but also the wind was picking up and shredding them at the top of the ridge). Eventually having fought a few collapses along the way i decided to give up and headed west out over the road and the flats. Mentally I'd already decided to work my way back to launch when I hooked into a huge but very smooth thermal that took me over 1400m and with that I drifted back into the Citrusdahl valley, though a few km before where I'd crossed briefly.
This time I worked hard to stay between 1500m and 2000m and found the climbs very smooth (had a steady 3.9m/s at one point whilst munching on some biltong...). I then drifted gently along the valley, passed the town at 1800m and headed towards my nemesis at Constriction. This time though (and after more briefing from Stefan Kruger - SA X-Alps entrant) I looked for the 2-3 triggers and found one good enough to take me through the valley head. Here it felt like a headwind and my groundspeed dropped |
