February 22-23, 2013: Long travel day and first Mentor 3 flight

February 22-23, 2013: Long travel day and first Mentor 3 flight

I was awake at 5:15AM on Friday morning before the alarm clock was set to go off at 5:30.  I got up and coaxed Mary Beth out of bed.  We finished up loading the Pathfinder and were on the road by 6:00 AM.  Peter, Paul, and Mary, the Beach Boys, and the Beatles among others rode along with us in the 12 hour  959 kilometer ( 595 mile) drive from Manilla NSW to Bright, Victoria. We seemed to find a McDonalds at every stopping place for gas or bio breaks. 

The Pathfinder performed well except for the fuel economy.  It cost us $240 Australian in gas to make the trip.  The Pathfinder is only getting 16 liters per 100 kilometers.  New on the highway the book says we should be getting 10.  No doubt the all terrain tires, the roof rack, the spotties, the bull bar, the UHF antenna and the 234,000 miles on the odometer have something to do with the poor performance on fuel economy.  Fuel here is currently averaging $1.56 per liter. When you convert that to US $ per gallon you get $6.11 per gallon.  I guess I won’t feel so bad about the prices we pay in the U.S when we get back

We rolled into Bright at 6:00 pm and checked in at the Backpacker’s Outdoor Inn that everyone in the free flight community affectionately refers to as Camp Crusty.  Terry was there to greet us and here the details of Mary Beth’s accident.  He then gave us the keys to unit 24.  The same cabin we have had for EVERY stay at Camp Crusty.

I made arrangements to pick up the new wing I had ordered back in December the following morning and we headed downtown for dinner.  One of our favorite restaurants, Liquid Amber was closed so we settled for take away pizzas from El Centro.  It’s a great place of pizza in Bright. Eat in or take away as they say here.

Saturday Fred called around 8:30 am and I met him at the landing paddock at 9:00 to pick up the new wing. The new wing is a Mentor 3 made by Nova.  According to Nova I should see improved glide performance and better handling.  You have to take that with a grain of salt because every manufacturer says the same thing when they bring out a new wing.  But I have seen big improvements in the EN B gliders from Nova over the years. This is my fourth wing from them.  Retirement has meant a lot more flying and so I am replacing wings more frequently now.  I put  243 hours on the Mentor 2 in 21 months.  It’s a little faded but still flies great.  But it’s not as crispy and the new wing  by a long shot.

My new wing over Bright

Cam and Heidi met us and we headed up the hill around 10:30.  It was a chance for me to get the feel of the glider earlier in the day before flying in thermic conditions.  There were already thermals out there when I launched.  I climbed up over launch easily and then played with steep turns, big ears and a few other maneuvers before landing at the LZ after about 35 minutes.  Heidi had a flight and Cam drove back down. 

Mystic LZ in Bright

We then headed back up for some more serious flying.  When we got up to launch it was blowing pretty strong but it was manageable.  I launched first and took a thermal up to 2100 meters behind Launch.  Cam had some problems and his launch was delayed quite a while. 

Finally he launched but instead of following me over the back, he headed out over  the valley towards town.  He had a nice buoyant flight and managed to fly over the stone face on Mt. Buffalo before joining me in landing at Porepunkah Airport.   Meanwhile I lost too much altitude heading for Clearspot and headed back over launch to tank up again.   I took a different path but when I got to the last ridge line before Mt. Buffalo things were shaded over and the best I could do was maintain before finally turning and landing at Porepunkah Airport. 

Is the camera still on?

The wing did everything I asked it to.  It seems to bank into turns more quickly with lighter brake pressures.  The yellow and blue are very easy to spot from the ground and since it is a custom color there won’t be a lot of others like it out flying unless the Swedish national paragliding team is out flying with me.  And its new and CRISPY!