Dartmoor Gliding News - Sunday 8th December 2013

It was a day when, after a couple of factors intervene to prevent the optimum launch rate, you were eventually grateful to the membership team for putting the trial lessons first and themselves second.  And it’s quite possible for this message to be communicated non-verbally: a rain shower here, an unintended cable break there, and on these short daylight days it’s very easy to lose the time required to fly a relatively modest flying list, let alone great British public, but members of the team seem to realise this without being told.

A not very promising start...’

Thus it was today when, as Roger Applebaron will tell you, the cloudbase at the start was well below the height of a K-8’s average launch.  We did, however, almost get into a groove before our twice postponed trial lesson students Anne Campkin, Mike Peace and son Joe arrived for their trial flights.

...But a burst of light at the finish

By the time these were complete, there was precious little time for anything else; but that’s not to say that Dave Parker, Darren Wills, Andrew Swann and the aforementioned Roger A didn’t fly, but just not very much.

Martin Cropper