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Yesterday's weather looked very poor in the morning and by
lunchtime I had decided that I wouldn't fly, although the sky did open up
later in the afternoon to provide a bit of fun for the more committed
pilots.
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Pic de Bure
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This morning's forecast was for strengthening northerly winds
with some wave, but it didn't look that way immediately after briefing. The
dark grey skies were leading me to regret having missed yesterday's action.
Blue sky was seen to the northwest which gave us some hope, so I prepared
the glider, just in case.
Seeing Roger in JAC exploring the lower reaches of the
tree-line on the Gache gave me pause for thought, but seeing other gliders
well above the ridge was enough encouragement for me to launch.
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Ecrins
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The air was nicely unstable and I soon had enough height to
get to the Lure and then push forward away from the airspace towards Chabre.
There were cumulus streets pointing conveniently in the right direction with
bases around the limit of FL75, which I was able to use as far as the Rosans
valley, where I found the wave.
There was plenty of cloud around; some overlapping lennies,
cumulus and what my former instructor would have described as
"heap" cloud; it reminded me very much of a typical day at Aboyne.
I picked my way up to FL110 and headed for the pic de Bure, finally getting
a cracking 7-knot climb that I took to FL185.
The Ecrins were covered in sheets of boiling cumulus and I
could not work out an obvious line to follow. I did find some lift in
various random places, but I didn't have the confidence to explore much
further than the central Ecrins. I'm sure Klaus from down the road would
have done better - oh, he
did...
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Lac de Sautet
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To finish the flight I did a downwind dash to Blayeul and
then across to the gorge de Meouge which was still kicking off some strong
wave. My circuit was "bouncy", as expected, and a 600ft final turn
one field back was about right for the landing.
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