On Feb 7, 4:08*am, tienshanman tienshanman.
wrote:
I must say that I am pleasantly stunned by the competent advice on this
forum - thanks to all you for your thorough comments, especially Burt
and Daryll. To Daryll I apologize for not offering more info about
myself. I am a little bit embarrassed to admit that my soaring
experience is, well, limited. Here’s the story if anyone is interested.
I am a US citizen who has been living/working in Kazakhstan since 1995.
Kind of got stuck here, married here to a beautiful Ukrainian woman and
have 3 small children. We live just outside of Almaty (2 mill pop) in a
small canyon in the Tien Shan Mountains. There are 10k ft peaks all
around us and a vast wilderness area to the south. One reason I have
stayed here so long is that I love being so close to big mountains and
all of the outdoors sports possibilities they offer. I have worked here
in telecoms and mining.

Many years ago while in the Army in Germany I started hang gliding and
have flown for a couple of decades, then I began in parallel to fly
paragliders. However, the bag wing for me is more of a means to get
down fast off of peaks rather than a flying machine. Sure, I thermal
around in the thing for while when possible but compared to a hang
glider or sailplane it never really felt like flying. On the contrary,
it’s more akin to being in an aerial lawn chair. But heh, it gets me
from the 3000 meter peak behind my house (3 hr ascent) to the field in
front of my house in 20 min, which beats the hell out of walking down
and trashing my knees. Throughout my flying “career” I have been
peripherally interested in sailplanes. In Germany there is a glider
club in practically every village and I can recall being in big
thermals in the alps with hg’s, bag wings and several sailplanes all in
one big gaggle like a flock of buzzards in Texas hovering over some road
kill. Once in Austria on a gorgeous day in early June I counted 15
different “aircraft” thermal ling at once and almost had a mid air
collision with a baggy while counting. Every so often my interest in
sailplanes would peak a bit and I would do a sailplane ride, but I was
frankly not very impressed by being cooped up in a plastic solarium for
20 mins on a sled ride to the ground. Then I’d look around the airfields
and the obvious hassle, time commitment, bureaucracy, *and expense all
turned me off as well. I’m not much of a joiner and didn’t *care much
for the European club thing.

But I am older now and thought I’d give sailplanes one more shot. Among
other considerations I need a safer way to fly. So last summer I spent 8
days at a Russian glider school where 2 gnarly instructors in their 50s
ran me through the ringer for 9 days, from 5 am to 10 pm every day,
with about 15 flights/day. Endless landing patterns, spins, stalls,
etc. On day 4 I soloed the Blanik and flew alone after that. Toward the
end I was thermalling the thing around for 3 hrs at a shot and could
have flown much longer had the bad seat and parachute ergonomics
(military parachute!) not killed the small of my back! I Finally being
able to soar a sailplane and stare straight up into an approaching
cloud base turned out to be incredible and to make a long story short I
am now officially addicted. Because I have started to fly sailplanes
rather late in life I want to compress as much of it into my life as is
possible. I am now trying to figure out how I can structure my life to
make this happen. More than likely we will return to the US this summer
and I have spent hours researching places to live which have the best
combination of access to good flying, good schools, a critical mass of
interesting people and culture and good weather. One thing I do not
want to do is drive anything more that about 15 – 20 min to a glider
field and I intend to buy a self launching glider if some sort. I have
a lot of other sports interests and children so travelling big distance
is out. So is being dependent on tow planes. Currently I am thinking of
moving to the People’s Republic of Boulder or the Ft. Collins, or
buying property at a flight park somewhere; something along those lines
(advice in terms of location would also be greatly appreciated). Burt: I
would be happy to live in Marfa but after a 12 drive through west Texas
last year my wife ruled that idea out! So out of all of these
ruminations emerged my off the wall question about glider rides. I had
been simply thinking of options for how to integrate sailplanes into my
life, perhaps even make small business out of it to give me that
illusion that I would be gainfully employed. Burt’s comments brought me
down to earth however, and it’s now clear that I am probably not suited
to the commitment necessary for this business. Also, I am fairly set on
buying a SL’ing glider and not a motorglider and it does not appear that
a twin seat SL’ing sailplane is the best machine for that sort of
business. So thanks again for putting up with my neophyte question and
for the very good advice on this subject and perhaps I’ll have the
pleasure of meeting some of you when I come back home. Burt I am dying
to come to Marfa and fly there. My brother now lives in El Paso so that
gives me the excuse to get there. In the meantime I am looking forward
to going back to the Russian glider school in May for 9 more days of
flying when I’ve been told I’ll get to practice out landings and do
some modest cross country flights. I cannot wait.

--
tienshanman

Clearly you need an Antares 20E !
Best Regards, Dave "YO electric"
www.nadler.com