Thursday, 21 June 2007

Another fine day in Laragne

Another fine day in Laragne. We could get used to this. Late starts, easy trip up the hill and landing back at the campsite where a pool and beer awaits. We are currently sitting under a ridge of high pressure that is likely to persist for the next week so hopefully this weather will continue.

We heard in the morning that there could be afternoon thunderstorms but unlike Griefenburg where the clouds were already starting to form by 9am, we were on the hill at 1pm with barely a wisp in the sky. Then the inversion started to break and the cu's started to form. There is XC course currently being run here and those pilots started to launch. As soon as we saw they were going up, Sam and I joined them. We went down the ridge and back and slowly made it to cloudbase.


We headed north towards Serres where we had landed previously but this time the clouds were looking even better.

We got down there easily with good climbs but got stuck there in weak lift. A whole bunch of others started to join us in the weak stuff. Apparently this ridge cycles and you just have to wait it out. We did plan to cross the valley to the bigger mountains to the east but there were no clouds. We got camping ground suck and headed back the 15km towards the main takeoff. It was an easy trip back.

Once back, and at 2500m, I just went for a jaunt across the French countryside in a big circuit, getting ever closer to that pool and beer.



We are making tracks today towards St Hillare and Annecy. Ciao to Laragne.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great pics ... hows the mounting camera working out?
PS Alien2 (from Xmas) is still alive and well in the kitchen.
DK

Anonymous said...

what a wonderful lot of flying you are getting in, makes our trip seem tame!! Very cold in Brisbane. Lovely to catch up with Pat.We take off to Hervey Bay 2morrow.Mum
Hi Tony, great update on your trip and the photo's are great.
We look forward to your blog every time we get access to a computer.
Dad

Anonymous said...

Hi Tony, Amazing photos. I love them all especially the one with Sarah and the rainbow. What an amazing part of the world, enjoy it!
Linda Hadley, it's been great having your folks here, the weather turned freezing and Nancy got caught out in her summer gear, Palmy rules??