New site (to me) Slieve Gallion

A local pilot and I went to Slieve Gallion today ("slieve" is the Irish word for mountain). I have only ever seen this mountain from a distance as I pass it on the way to other sites and thought that it couldn't be that difficult to get to as it is so large and can be seen for miles. This is not the case as there is no direct road to the mountain from the direction that I was approaching it from.

When we arrived there were several other pilots in the car park huddled up waiting for the wind to drop to usable levels, there were also some hang glider pilots rigging their gliders between the car park and take off.

This site is great as there are land-able slopes almost all over the face we were going to be flying. There is only one small fence next to a small crevice that ran from the top of the hill down to the bottom. There were massive green fields out in front of the slopes so I was happy there were so many get out options should I need them.

After a while everyone moved up to the take off and the wind was slowly falling to acceptable levels for the more advanced pilots. Slowly everybody took off one by one until there was just me left on the hill, there were eight paragliders and one hang glider in the air. I still wasn't that happy with the wind levels for a while after that.

Others flying at Slieve Gallion

Eventually after all the hangies had given up and some of the other paraglider pilots had had their fill for the day the wind had settled enough for me to be confident enough to launch. My first flight was several soaring beats then a slope landing when the wind seemed to have given up completely. I was comforted in the fact that it wasn't just me the wind had left down when other pilots landed further down the slop from me. I bunched up the glider and walked back up to take off.

After a short while the wind returned to it's previous strength, with only about 5 pilot still flying I was easily encourages to go back up again. This time the plan was to try and get enough height to top land. Unfortunately I get wrapped up in all the soaring and kind of forgot about the top landing until I had lost so much height I needed to slope land anyway.

It seems after I fly a site for the first time I experience a feeling of relief and of understanding to how the site works. This probably comes from the fact that when you fly above a hill there is nothing hidden from sight, when you can see all there is a lot less scope for surprises.