Finally bagged a top landing at Big Collin

With just a few short hours to go play I set out for Big Collin. I had read on our club mailing list that a couple of pilots were going to see if it was flyable. As I approached the site I could see that there were already plenty of cars parked up at the bottom of the hill and a couple of gliders out of bags.

I arrived and greeted some faces I hadn't seen for a while. After a chat I climbed up to the top with the plan of taking the first opportunity to top land as I had never yet managed a top landing at this site.

I took off and managed to soar for a short while (which for me is a very rare thing at BC) and then took the opportunity to top land. The wind was such that it took me a little while for the wing to drop me down on the top of the hill almost vertically. After that I was happy to take off and risk slope landings safe in the knowledge that I had finally achieved a top landing at the site that I have probably flown the most.

I got another couple of flights in. One about five minutes long which ended with a slope landing near the top and then finished off with a top to bottom then stuffing my wing in the car and heading home.

I have taken to putting the wing in the boot of the car then packing away on my front lawn when I get home. I find it a more relaxed way of doing things and I take time to check the wing over with less chance of the wind undoing the packing before I have everything in the bag.

Knockagh

Today I flew at the site we refer to as Knockagh. It is a cliff site located near Greenisland and is easily recognised by the Konckagh Monument war memorial that is over 100 feet tall that is at the car park  The site does have several hazards such as power lines and an abundance of trees which means the bottom landing option can be quite tight. As it is a cliff face it seems to allow soaring in quite light winds. The most important feature of this site to me is that is only a few miles from where I live and I can see if anyone is flying it without leaving the house.

Dave takes off over the gorse

The take off field is very restrictive with large gorse bushes just in front and a line of trees right behind which doesn't leave much room for mistakes in ground handling. I almost didn't manage to get the wing above my head on the first go due to the wind being so light. As soon as the wing was up I had a bit of a run,  dodged a couple of gorse bushes and I was away to join the other four pilots that were already in the air.

During the flight I noticed what looked like the wife's car driving away from the car park. I wondered if the family had been up to wave at me.

After about 50 minutes flying and after all the other pilots had landed I made what I though was an excellent landing in the designated top landing field. Unfortunately the battery had gone on the Go Pro about 10 minutes earlier so it is missing from the below video.

Slieve Gallion again

I think the fruits of flying six days out of the last eight have been realised today. I felt a little bit more confident about what I was doing. I still found my self checking and double checking my pre flight checks but when I was ready to go I simply checked there was no-one in my way (and that I wasn't going to get in anyone else's way) and launched.

My first flight plan was to get a bit of height and top land, I did get some height, then I lost it, then I found it again so I had only been in the air a few minutes when I was coming in for a top landing. "Top landings, nothing to worry about!" It had been playing on my mind that I hand't performed a top landing completely on my own before, i.e. without the comfort of an instructor on the radio should I not quite get things right. I was glad to get this out of the way.

We were sharing the hill with Phil and a few students (well they were there before us). The wind had moved further around to the West than the previous day and this meant that the face we were soaring was smaller. So after trying to share and fit in with the other pilots I got another flight in with the same plan to top land, but this time maybe keep the wing inflated and relaunch straight away. This wasn't to be as the loss of height meant a slope landing and a short walk back to the top.

Before I could launch again a huge thermal came through, the experienced pilot I was flying with was able to make the most of it but the student (Jim) who was up at the time probably had a bit of eye opener. The instructor Phil talked him calmly through pulling big ears to lose the height he had been gifted. He eventually went on to safely bottom land in a field that seemed miles away.

After I had watched all the fun I realised that there were what seemed to me like rain clouds heading our way so I packed up happily in the knowledge I had now slain my top landing demon.

Not quite read to go home we headed for another site where we knew a pilot was trying to ride out the rain. We parked at the bottom and watched the clouds pass just over the top of White Mountain while we ate sandwiches and tried to spot the hiding pilot. The weather didn't lift so we drove up to Dungiven which was only a few miles away but it was deserted. We were going to head for Magilligan but saw that from a distance that part of the world was also in cloud. At this we headed home but no one can say we didn't try.