SAFA Skysailor Magazine

18 SKY SAILOR November | December 2024 the pub for an afternoon drink and then a walk to the gorge. Two pilots and a dog enjoyed a swim despite locals telling us that three croc- odiles were seen 100m away just 20 minutes earlier, “Only freshies, so they don’t bite much. We’ve been sending our kids down to swim for years, and they still keep coming home.” Before sunset, Nir and Kyle hiked up the hill closest to town and probably had the first launch off it, soared in the evening breeze and landed at the pub. We told the locals to expect the flights, so they gathered outside the pub to watch. A local farmer rang all her neighbours saying, “Get outside and look at Red Rock, there are two crazy guys going to ‘jump’ off it!” Einasleigh is where we all watched UFOs for 30 minutes, only to find out two days later at Forsayth airfield that they were helicopters doing geological scanning! The following day was too windy to fly, so the team bypassed two airfields to camp at Croydon. This is where most pilots had their best flying. Kyle arranged with the school to educate them about paragliding and on his first flight, landed at the school and had a Q&A session with the kids. Tess and Gavin were flying overhead, so Kyle pointed them out and they spoke to the kids over his radio. Later in the day, pilots tried to follow the task, but this was again difficult due to the crosswind. Two pilots battled for 5 or 6 hours to get 70km, enjoying the challenge and views. We stayed a second night at Croydon as we had gotten ahead of schedule with the no-fly days. The next day everyone had great flights and at different stages were thermalling together in different pairings. That night we stayed at Leichardt Camp beside a lagoon FNQ Safari – Croc Jumpers have fun Photos: Kim Dacombe, Gavin Milne and Kyle Utley