Alphen aan den Rijn on February 5 2008.
Sorry that I was a bit late with my post this week. Yes in the far-away past I loved CARNAVAL. I even was a member of a carnaval club and we celebrated from 11-11 till the the last possible celebration day.
This weekend I visited my home town and had a “few” with my brothers. Great fun! I even looked at the procession and though I did not know all the actual news, I could laugh a lot about many jokes.
Yes, yes , I started talking about gliding in Europe last week and some pilots made some nice long flights already. World-format-pilot Rainhard Schramme made a nice flight over 500 km. in Germany and yes of course I know he is an excellent pilot but it is still very early in the season and the fields are TRULY wet!!!
This week somebody flew over 700 km. in Poland and that really amazed me. I studied his track flying from the field of Jelinea Gora, which is SE of Klix and he flew up and down to the W and E of his field up to 6000 m. in a Ventus 17.6 m. The pilot flying in his SZD 50 Puchacz did a great job too, flying nearly 400km. .
So …we can soon enjoy great soaring all over Europe again.
I heard that some of my Tocumwal friends visit Europe too now. Instead of flying in Tocumwal Hiroko travels to Saint Auban now. Mac visited Toc and his old mate Ingo and he flew in Corowa , where they still flew 2 1000 km flights on February 1. Great effort as I know the days are getting shorter already then.
Other great friends Mikiko and Shige are having their first baby in a few months. Quite a few of you remember surely their wedding under the tree in Tocumwal.I am sure I am talking for all of you when I wish them well.
Toc. is by the way going strong and Rudolf, Jochen and Hans have arrived for some flying there. They just love their flying and are not racing or chasing high targets.
It was nice to see that Chad , who was one of “our” USA guests in better times, still came over to fly in OZ and made his choise for Corowa, which is only 85 km from Toc.
This upcoming season I will try to visit more gliding fields in Europe, time permitting ofcourse, as I have a rather busy job in ART!!!
That’s it for now, sorry for the delay and enjoy your week.
Cheers Ritz
Dear Ritz
Small remark about flight that are made from Jelenia Gora. Those are wave flights not thermal, and they are doing this during all autumn and winter. So far longest flight from JG was almost 1000 km last year and they are expecting to break 1000 km sooner or leater. They are flying to Jasienik and some times have visitors from Klix, so as You can see there are a lot of possibilities.
Best Regards