SAFA Skysailor Magazine

10 SKY SAILOR May | June 2022 The final hurdle After catching a few more thermals, we found ourselves very high over Swifts Creek, making us shift the goal posts a little further. The remainder of the flight was surreal. I couldn’t believe it, we could see the Tasman Sea, something I never imagined in my wildest dreams. Maybe we could make it to the coast? How cool would it be to land on the beach? What did we have to do? Ahead of us was a swathe of trees with no visible landing options. Over the years, people have discussed the pos- sibility of flying to the coast but no one ever mentioned the 15km tree crossing between Tambo Crossing and Bruthen. It looked very intimidating and there was also a big storm cell to the SW which had grown enough to hit the higher level winds, possibly shading us out. After pondering our options, we decided the tree crossing was too risky. We joined up, hooted and hollered, took some photos, called it quits and landed at Ensay sports oval. The descent took 20 (long) minutes and we landed to the applause of campers. Aline and Donna were waiting with hugs and cold beers and we packed up our wings to the sound of thunder, which explained the long descent – the whole area was releasing. Post flight contemplation Could we have flown to the coast? Maybe. I think from 2000m above the terrain at Tambo Crossing we could have made the glide to Bruthen (with current wind direction). The possibility of overdevelopment was a concern, one we didn’t realise fully until after we landed and heard the clap of thunder. Would we have had enough daylight? From Ensay it was a further 50km to Lakes Entrance. Given our average speed of around 20km/h up to this point, it would take another 2 to 2.5 Bright to Ocean Views