You can't park that there mate!
Well the planning started around Wednesday and among the team we were all thinking it would be a north to south run, but from where. Friday evening at around 7pm. And the decision has been made that myself, Joe and Al would be heading to The Wrekin to try and maximise what looked to wb a very good day, then, by 8pm and in typical XC pilot fashion that plan has changed to the Lecky milk run. Logistics alone made this the favourable choice, especially for me as I had to be in work for 7pm Saturday night. If I made it to Weymouth then the retrieves were pretty good on that Trainline and if I bombed, at least I flying towards home for most of the flight and not away from it.
8.45am Saturday and after a plee on the Avon chat Ken W said he had a space for me in his car and gave me a lift to the hill from Bristol Parkway station, where I left the car for an easy retrieve. We were off early and we pulled into the carpark at Lecky where we found every man and his dog. There was no doubting it was the place to be, but this was busy even by a good XC day standards.
I was on the hill and unpacking kit by about 9.45 ish as the familiar faces continued to litter the take off. Kit sorted and ready by just after 10 and plenty of time to stand around and have a good chat.
It was obvious that it wouldn't be a super early start today and the sky still didn't contain any really established CU by 11am, however Joe D was in his kit and eager so was first to take to the air. Everyone watched Joe as he frolicked a couple of hundred feet above takeoff and slow but surely the numbers started to increase as pilots flung themselves off like lemmings. Kirsty and I set up near eachother and remained in close conversation about when we would launch, Lecky has got the better of even the best XC pilots as they have left too early and been caught out just downwind.
It was around 11.40 when we actually did go for it and at first it was a case of work some stuff that didn't feel exactly, established yet but soon enough there were a second gaggle climbing and looking to follow the first that had gotten away 10 minutes or so before. That's first gaggle contained Joe D and Guy A so it would have been nice to catch up with them. Our gaggle contained myself, Kirsty and Al among a few others but a climb or two away we could always see the others, like a wavering mirage tempting us into the desert. We remained disciplined and by now the sky really looked to be working and established with climbs of 3ms and up to 4000 feet. I was pretty confident within the first 10km that the coast would be reached today.
Myself and Al pushed on a bit and lost Kirsty to the gaggle behind, we approached the 4500 feet airspace at Bristol CTA and I had to go full bar and 90° off course just to get some height off as Al and I had took a lovely climber not long before. We made it through the airspace and I immediately took a climb, Al, in his usual fashion just pressed straight on, no surprise really as the sky looked fantastic and we knew this area well wenough. I watched as he hot smaller and further away but I took my climb to base and got just over 5000 feet as the white horse at Westbury provided a familiar backdrop to the Easy. It was here that I noticed a friendly blue Zeno about 1500 feet below me, "Joseph" I said out loud, knowing he couldn't hear me. He was a bit lower but him, Steve A and Ella were all together and Steve and Joe were climbing. I linked up with them and we formed a nice little gaggle from this point.
We took a couple of nice climbs between Westbury and Mere with 2.5 - 3 ms being the average and all taking me to base and beyond. As I hit the white room I left and pointed cross wind towards our goal and the newly forming CU, in typical fashion Joe left his climb with whatever height he had and followed, ballsy, but we fly together a lot ita great to have the trust in eachother to just stay together.
It's hard to try and make the rest of the flight sound exciting, sure the sky had blued a bit but there were still plenty of CU, I was regularly hitting 5 grand and above, and despite having to negotiate the Easterly component of the wind, I never had a doubt we would get in from 36km outs.
I saw Al and Guy at around 30km out, they had pushed further west and were seemingly doing very well. Opting to stay on my track I again pushed on and unfortunately Joe and Steve and Ella were now a climb or so behind so I just took no chances.
11km out I had about a 12:1 to get in so I pushed forward and took another climb at Dorchester, watching as Guy came in low below me, he's doomed I thought, or maybe he has opted to land here, either way, I took a climb until I saw 8:1 on the Oudie and off I went. Q lovely lofty line in to goal despite the cross wind and as I secured Goal with the ping of three instruments as all cylinders changed colour, I looked for my landing field. There it was, a big old playing field / park. Plenty of room with houses on one side and a main road on the other. I am not sure I could have asked for much better, I have certainly landed in much worse. I eyed up the spot, just between the goal posts and the boxer dog chasing a ball that was being thrown by it's owner and I set up to come in across the road between two trees. All was going well but as I made my approach through the trees one reached out and snatched at the right tip of my glider, like a troll grabbing at a trespasser to demand a toll for crossing his bridge. The tree grabbed tightly and as it did, swung me around, I reached out and secured myself to the first branch for safety. "Twat" I shouted as a voice shouted back, 'you ok mate" I assured everyone I was and looked down to see the very busy road come to a stand still as people jumped out of their car to help me.
I dangled for a minute and then started to untangle myself as the generous and helpful people secured my wing and prevented damage.
Joe came and landed perfectly before jumping out of his harness running over and shouting excitedly "Wez, Wez stay there" then got his phone out and took valuable pictures. A plan was being formulated and thankfully a passer by cruised by with his window down and informed me "You can't park that there mate" I won't pretend I saw the funny side.
It was agreed the branches would have to be cut and Joe offered to come up and do it as he carries a saw, "I'm really high" was my only comment despite being no matter than 12 feet above the ground, however, 12 feet seems a long way when faced with the prospect of jumping from a tree, irrespective of spending hours at cloud base.
A sterling job was done by Joe on the tree felling and a big thank you to all who assisted me. No injuries but it really was a very minor incident and provided much laughter on the way home.
We talked with Kirsty as we walked along the road to the train station and despite all of us checking before we left the hill, the trains were cancelled and there was one option, 5.35 to temple meads which meant that I would be getting to work at 9pm and 2 hours late. All in all my retrieves this season have been pretty bloody crap, today's was made better being surrounded by the many many pilots who all made goal on a brilliant day.