Photos by Steve Durkin
Download fullsize images from flickr. Photos by Jitka Polechova
Download fullsize images from flickr. Photos by Brian Steele
Download fullsize images from flickr. Photos by Dominic
Download fullsize images from flickr Sunday and what a great day... Thermic flying in a mountain environment in February and all in the company of good friends! Surely it doesn't get better than that! In the end Zeno, Jitka, Dominic, Tim Bryson, Tim Jackson, Brian and myself wandered up from Inveroran to take a look at Ben Toig. Arriving at a high launch at about 12:30 it felt like we just missed a first thermic cycle, and there was no wind to speak of at all. After a wee while the thermals started to pick up and eventually Brian and myself took to the air. It was a scratchy start, but it continued to pick up and soon we were thermalling high above take off courtesy of 6-up thermals - according to my vario log which is sat in front of me now, the max climb was just under 7-up. Great! After dotting around for a while Brian set off to get some XC miles in over towards the white corries. I watched him go then just returned to cruising about with the others and enjoying the spectacular scenery. Tim Jackson arrived later than the rest of us, and it has to be said missed the best part of the day but still managed to get a decent flight in after we had all landed out.
I want to go through the decision making for the day because it's such a critical part of the day and I'm always interested in the background behind other peoples decisions. I hesitate to invite feedback via email... but honestly I'm interested in other folks comments!
I found Sunday's forecast tricky - I had the day completely free so didn't want to waste it. I was keen to get up North and fly some bigger hills if the opportunity arose. I did join the Scottish *Mountain* Paragliding Club after all! Glencoe looked possible, but by Saturday evening stronger winds were forecast for the west coast later in the day - up to 30mph at 3,000ft according to MWIS. These would be fuelled, it seemed by the strong pressure gradient between a deepish depression in the Atlantic pushing up to the high pressure sitting over Scotland. On Sunday morning the spot wind forecast issued at 6.00am from the Metoffice looked a little more optimistic, with 10mph SE winds at 5000ft up to three o'clock for Glen Affric (admittedly east and much further north than we were planning to go). Cloudbase was forecast higher in the north and west. It was looking possible. Brian and I met up at the steading at 7.58 and departed at 8.02. (How often does that happen?) On the way up North we talked over what we wanted to get out of the day. We were both keen to get up to the mountains, and the forecast was making it look do-able. What would Ulric do if he was here? Put some bloody big rocks in his harness and keep going - that's what! Crucially we were both willing to risk poor,or even no flying for a day in the mountains. The worst that could happen is we walk up something big and walk down again, but let's face it, how bad can a day spent walking in the highlands be in weather like that? We resolved on Glencoe as Brian reminisced about the good old days of the SMPC...
Our conviction wavered at the Killin burger van as we met up with Johan, Zeno, Jitka, and Domninc and discussed the options. News of DT's prognosis strong winds for Glencoe was a test of our resolve. With all I'd seen in the forecasts I wasn't keen to hang around. I was pretty sure it would be flyable at Glencoe, and if it was going to get blown out later then there didn't seem much point in standing around waiting for it to happen. But on the other hand it seemed sensible to drive up towards Ben Lawers and see what the weather was doing. We did. The inversion was below the visitor centre, the sun was shining weakly through a veil of high cloud and what little wind there was was variable, but predominantly from the west. I figured that with the high pressure positioned right over Scotland we'd be best putting some distance between ourselves and the middle of the HP where the met winds felt disorganised. So that put us back to Ben Toig - a good site with an obvious SE slope, further west, and a track record, all set in fantastic scenery! The rest is history. Well almost. I've been thinking about what we experienced on the day, and at times the wind was very strong. Winds at 3000ft were exceeding 20mph on occasions, but generally were much less. Generally I think the met wind was lighter than would first have appeared from Saturday's forecast - that was certainly the reading of the early Sunday forecasts from the Met office, but I suspect that the lighter dynamic conditions we experienced may have been in part due to the strong thermic conditions blocking or lifting the gradient wind. The stronger wind we encountered from time to time would have been between thermic cycles. Now does that make sense, or am I just talking complete b*llocks? Or most likely I am simply over-analysing a fantastic day on the hill!
Well - I think I've spent more time on writing this email than I did actually flying. Not a good ratio and one I hope to redress. But it was an epic day. Not measured in distance from take off to landing but in grins from ear to ear! What a great day, and what great company. Long may it last! Woohoo! |
