SAFA Skysailor Magazine

10 SKY SAILOR January | February 2024 I rattle up to speed, lift off, stuff the bar back, zoom over the blurring grass. Little side swings I ignore, keeping the height right. This flight I am smoother and closer to keeping the tug on the horizon. In the turns, I make little jabs, then wait to see the effect before doing more, or not. I’m expecting the arm out sig- nalling I’m too high or low, but it never comes. Maybe I am doing okay? Robbo follows and we both get two tandem and two solo tows that day. After this, a variety of hang gliders arrive for fun flying. Robbo and I join the group, helping with several launches. The gliders are all types – Malibu, Wills Wing intermediate, Litespeed, and an Atos. The Atos is almost a sailplane, half weight-shift, half spoiler control. I complain about the weight of my 35kg Gecko, pilot Pete tells me this thing is 50kg and has 20kg of ballast in the harness, that’s like carrying another person around! He is a bit hard to take seriously, wearing what appear to be black active wear pants with hi-vis dayglo yellow patches on both knees and a glowing crutch patch – eye catching in just the wrong way! He had a good flight in the Atos flying for over an hour and a half, and gets about 500ft higher than everyone else. At the other end of the spectrum, Max flies a crisp new Malibu and harness – it’s the same as mine, a Moyes Contour, but not yet covered in scuff marks and permanent dust shading. Max is in his mid-20s and an agricultural robot engineer. I’ve seen these four-legged things that can herd cattle (slowly) and take feed to them. Also trailers for tractors that see weeds and laser them, leaving organic weed free crops. The day ends in the clubhouse, with a Learning to aerotow My Fun set up on the launch trolley Humphrey drops the trolley, on tow, and airborne at Forbes All photos: Andrew Berenyi