The Dish

Our team has been staying at Lens place, outside Forbes in Rustic Australia. The stars are amazing out there. For those that have seen the movie "The Dish", the facility is just outside Parkes. Yesterday we flew north 92km and back. At least that was the task, however during the day a 27km southerly developed and made the return quite challenging.
The storms probably created the southerly draw. I ended up 8km short, after 6hrs 41mins and drifting 10kms backwards, ... But I found a nice place to land, and they gave me a beer or two :) It had 43'C during the day !

An easy day

An easy day to screw up :) Race conditions prevailed today, staying up was easy. Getting to goal quickly was the trick. Teammate Len did well there, taking the last start gate and almost catching us all up.

The day looked good straight out of the briefing. Here are our lovely hosts Vicki and Greg on the cart train.Getting ready, in 30mins we will be 7000ft up under the clouds.
And here we are, getting ready for the 2pm 10km start gate. I had a good start crossing 8 seconds after the clock, at cloud base. It doesn't get much better than that. I was flying with Blay and Atilla. It wasn't long before they left me. I made a few decisions today that slowed me down. Fast days are not my strength. Here is team mate Guy coming into land. The winds were light(ish) and variable. There were some interesting "arrivals" at goal today.

Day 5 - Never give up !

Pilots briefing. 3 consectutively worse starts yesterday. I had a slight advantage yesterday as the top 20 pilots were forced to take the second start. I decided the day was improving so I waited for one more start clock. However I ended up lower and farther downwind. It was 15 min after the last start clock that I really got going :\

So, I messed that up!
Most of the flight was survival mode, it took me 6 hrs 12 to get round the course, I was spent! I managed to dribble along downwind toward goal in 40feet per minute until I had 12:1, I got to got with 100m to spare.

I suspect I will be sore straight off the cart today.

Jonny is doing a much better job of blogging the event : http://jonnydurand.blogspot.com/

Forbes Day 4

Today was a fun day. Flew the course 127km out and return cross wind. Here is the team i am flying with : Flocky, Guy and Len. Simon is our driver. Atilla is making a guest appearance. I took the second start as I thought it might Storm later on in the day. I would have taken the first if I was in the position.I am glad I wasn't since we had to wait for the clouds to follow us down there. I almost landed where I did yesterday, it was wet and slow. I got passed it on a quiet low glide and took a slow 50 feet / min climb 20kms off course. Still, better than landing short :)

Better read Jamies Blog !

Its been difficult finding time to get on the internet. So I'll point you to Jamie who has been doing a great job at covering the events. I had a good day 2, but yesterday I was to aggressive and landed after just 3 climbs.

However having seen goal from the car, I am somewhat relieved I didn't get there.

http://naughtylawyertravels.blogspot.com/

results : http://www.moyes.com.au/Forbes2010/Results/Results.aspx

Happy New 2010 from Forbes

Australia has great ginger beer, vegimite and bread that doesn't taste like stale sponge cake. Just one aspect of Oz I was looking forward to.Down in Batemans Bay, we avoided some of the heavier rain that landed up north. In the mean time we tried a bit of fishing, first attempt since I was 12 or so.
To my amazement I caught a few. This one is just a "tiddler".
But this one was almost the size of a bridge. We think it was a mutant giant Bream.
There are some great places to snorkel down here. I didn't take my camera with me this time, since it filled with water last time... Did get to swim with some stingray, parrot fish, more bream, some blue and yellow fish, and Nemo.

This morning I had a brief conversation with this chap about US currency value to the local dollar, "Cheap as" he shook he head "cheap as..."

Happy Christmas from Newcastle

Its been a quiet week in Newcastle. I've been doing a little town touring, shopping, swimming and riding around on a bike. The weather has been georgeous. This is Merewether a fairly famous place to fly. Their are many places to launch and land, Dixon Park, Strzelecki. Saturday was the day to fly but having just arrived I didn't really have my gear ready. I rode out to Nobby's Head and up the Hunter river a bit until I was thoroughly lost. I ended up in amongst what I have been told is the biggest coal port in the world, with most of it going to China and Japan. There looked to be a storm brewing so I headed back, catching the mamatus clouds on the way back.
And this has to be the biggest pool I have ever swum in!

2 beaches, 2 seasons, 2 hemispheres

With most of my stuff stashed here and there - thanks Ryan ;) I took one last 2009 run around Santa Cruz. The air was quite clear at sea level after the snows. That afternoon I left for SFO. Thanks for the lift Brian :) After a stop to say Hi to the Moyes folks and check out the glider I plan on flying at Forbes, I arrived in Newcastle. This is one of the launches in Merewether, and where Tinks last flew. I just about melted from the heat the first day, I was happy to learn that it was a *hot* day, and not just me. Its great to be here :)