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Definitely not boring at Camden ...
Saturday saw excellent conditions following the
passage the rather windy conditions on Friday afternoon and
evening. Coupled with low temperatures overnight and plenty of sun in the
morning, the Cu were popping at 9:30 before we could even get the gliders
washed, DI-ed and onto the airfield. By 10:30 it was really looking good,
with long streets heading way down south towards the NSW Southern
Highlands.
From the first flight, the Club fleet of 3 IS-28s
were all reporting good climbs to 4500 ft (the ceiling above Camden due to
descents into Sydney Kingsford Smith). Phil Endicott in his Pilatus (the
"Philatus") got away early, followed by Bob Balfour (NSW Scout Gliding Wing in
Sydney Gliding's Astir) and Don Palmer in the Southern Cross Jantar. Our
first AEF passenger for the day got called back because we needed the glider -
he got 51 minutes, which is not bad for a first flight !
Then we had an end change called by the control
tower just after midday, as the wind favoured now 06 more than 24. So, off
to the other end of the strip - pie cart, IS-28 and Junior in tow. We got
two more launches from 06 before the wind swung again and the tower called for a
return to 24 - blast ! We waited it out, less than convinced that it would
stay, and thankfully we were rewarded with a change back to 06. Talk about
fickle. During the brief period the tower were calling 24, Phil Endicott
hangar landed long in his Pilatus and rolled it right down the runway, and
stopped just past the pie cart (remember it was at the bottom of 06) - if
there were a prize for the most impressive landing roll, Phil would have been
the day's winner..
The flights were all getting over the 45 minute
mark, and the single seaters that had taken off earlier were no doubt enjoying
the conditions. We asked the tower to call back another of the two
seaters, this time an instructor and student who'd had nearly an hour. The
tower responded with a rather comical call "Charlie Quebec Bravo - come home
!!!". Oh well, sometimes you've just got to share the Club fleet as
best as you can, otherwise everyone would stay up for 3-4 hours and we'd all be
lucky to get 1 flight per day. We grabbed the K-13 from the hangar to
boost our capacity when a few more people arrived - 4 twin seaters were now
enjoying lots of great Spring flying.
I got a lovely 44 minutes in the K-13 with my
5 year old son Blake in the back seat enjoying every minute - "Dad, those
turns are tickling my tummy !!!" (while laughing all the way). Nice
to fly over our house at Mt Annan, the race track at Oran Park, and to race
the traffic down the Hume Highway on a quick dash to the Menangle Raceway.
I had to pull a bit of airbrake to get down into the circuit, but then we got
the low level sink over Camden and a bit of tricky turbulence on final due
to the trees on the crosswind side of the runway.
I departed at just after 3pm, the other single
seaters still out somewhere after getting to Mittagong (reports indicate they
went across to Warragamba Dam), and the two seater fleet lapping it
up.
Sunday was apparently a repeat of the excellent
conditions from Saturday. As an added bonus, Derek Ruddock (normally
flying from the other end of the rope as an instructor) got sent solo in the
Pawnee under the watchful eye of our tug master, and pulled off a few greaser
landings in tricky conditions.
Another enjoyable weekend at Camden, and Summer is
still to come ... Regards
Jason Armistead
Southern Cross Gliding Club
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