Flying the Isle of Skye

The wind was too light and the sky was too blue to get high, but there was enough lift with weak thermals to stay above the ridge. There was an absolutely no wind period of the day between 1-2’o clock. Then I felt the wind slowly gaining strength again, so decided to take off. I was pulled far above the take off point very quickly. I tried to go over the nearest peak, and do some longer ridge soaring but I failed to get high enough and I felt like the wind is weaker when I get higher and there was a height where I could not break through. The peaky rock in front of me was too close and I feared some rotor behind it, so every time I got there I turned back. Probably without that rock it would be much easier to go further, because the ridge was bigger that way. But the others were struggling with it as well, so maybe I was right staying away from the rotor.

Even if it was not an epic day, the view was amazing and worth getting up before dawn.

I saw 2 gliders took off from the very top of the hill, but they ended down there with us in 5 minutes. What a waste of 40 minutes walk! The day ended at around 4’o clock, when I launched into the nil wind, but right in front of the ridge surprisingly there was lift. Slowly I lost height and landed in the bottom car park.