Having written about my attempts and finally achieving the silver duration, how did I get the height and distance? For the height we once again travel back in time to RAF Locking and the 60's for my first serious attempt. Having progressed beyond first solos in the T21 and having filled pages of my logbook with 2 min flights in the Tutor (Slingsby T8), I was looking to flying something more advanced. Just at that time the club acquired an ex ATC Slingsby Prefect, here then was the plane to take me to higher places. The RAF Locking Gliding Club was based on Weston-Super-Mare airfield; it was called the "Mendips" Gliding Club. It still exists today but not in RAF hands and is now located near Chedder. Unfortunately WSM airfield is not a good gliding site, close to the coast the sea breeze front very quickly wipes out any thermal lift. However one day with wind direction blowing off shore I got myself into a thermal that was going up nicely. At 2500ft and just South of the Bristol Control Zone, thoughts of silver height starting ringing in my head, but without a barograph there would be no record. That's OK, I thought, go down, land, get a barograph and get back up again! Of course youthful enthusiasm is not rewarded in this way. You can all guess, once I eventually got my barograph smoked, signed and loaded, there was not sniff of lift and the chance was gone. I did learn from this is, what is the point of chasing after badge flights if you miss the experience. What I should have done of course was to enjoy the flight, the thermal and not worry about a badge.

Once again a time warp of 20 years and 1 month finds me in the middle of an overseas posting to RAF Wildenrath in Germany and gliding with the RAF Bruggen, Pheonix Gliding Club in the country where gliding is a national sport. One hot June day with the temperature rise pushing through the usual inversion and the only wind being very much thermal influenced I was flying the club K18. The K18 is a good-looking glider (see pic), a K8 GTi! A K8 with a modified fuselage and K6e type wings. It has a 16 metre wingspan and a glide ratio of 34:1 at 74 km/h. Strangely these modifications result in the tail section being very heavy when pushing the thing back to launch point. The 'iffy' wind direction resulted in one winch launch with a very noticeable tail wind component in which the very thought of trying to gain height is deadly. This is of course is a winch launch failure in the same league as a cable break and should be treated as such. Fortunately my landing at the other end of the airfield prompted the decision to change ends and I found myself at the front of the queue with a headwind launch! The flight was local soaring in good lift in the conditions associated with the continental summer high-pressure block. After about 30 mins I found myself at a height where with more time and effort in a barograph (still smoked, today's technology had not yet intruded) equipped glider. A quick radio call and the luxury of an inactive MATZ and the silver height was in the bag!

Now for the distance, this takes more planning, more thought and the CFI once again on your side. The usual silver distance route avoiding most snags was south passing over RAF Wildenrath 10 miles away also inactive at weekends and onwards to the German Air Force base of Norvenich. RAF Wildenrath had a power flying club and one day I found myself in a Cessna flying South of Wildenrath towards the area of the gliding club's usual silver goal. The area South of Wildenrath is interesting in that it consists of mainly open cast coal mines. You would think that would help navigation, but as there is so many of them it does not! However this flight was a very good Navex for a future silver distance flight (is this cheating?). Now readers of this series of mine, will now be expecting the usual hiccup in my attempts. So here it comes. A Sunday in summer, a super day, inversion going up, gliding club is a rush of pre-flight planning of who is going to do what and where. Wait a minute I want a go too, please CFI can I do my silver distance? "Yes, plan a downwind route clear of airspace, mark your map and prepare your barograph". "Downwind but that's to the West today!" My pre-planned Navex was as useful as a chocolate teapot.

The planned task was fly down wind and West from Bruggen, cross the border near Roemond, fly across Holland and into Belgium with a goal destination of Balen-Keihuvel (once was host a vintage glider meeting), task distance of 63 km. Fairly straightforward then for a first cross country! CFI instructions were; get high, stay high and get comfortable with the thermals before setting off. So I did what was asked, launched and local soared for an hour slowly drifting downwind towards the Roemond lakes. At 6000ft and now in Holland with Bruggen fading from view, this was the decision point. The whole point of the silver distance is to land somewhere else, to give the pilot confidence in his ability to soar, navigate and land if required in fields. This moment can be a big thing for some pilots, but with 6000ft on the clock and full of confidence it was an easy decision. Things went quite nicely for a while heading down track watching the world go by and keeping track of where I was on the map. But there seemed an absence of thermals since I decided to go! This of course is sods law. I decided to head for a small town near the Belgium Air Base of Kleine-Brogel (another weekend de-activated MATZ), on the hope that the built up area would produce some lift. No such luck and the height now is getting a bit iffy. Best not land in the Air Base, although it looks tempting. I found a nice field that fitted all the criteria, had been ploughed and raked smooth, brown soil coloured with a good surface. This then was the one, at 900ft one final good look for obstructions, poles, fences etc. What is that annoying noise? The vario beeping, something I had not heard for while. My brown field was a thermal source. Weak at first but getting stronger with height, at 3000ft my task was back on.

A look at the map showed a big red nasty area between me and goal. The Leopoldsburg danger area (EBD 42, 0-5000ft), I could see lots of tank tracks etc in it. So carefully skirting around the outside to the North and West I moved towards my goal. Finally I could see a gaggle of other gliders circling. That must be it. Another sods law dictates that when in sight and range of your goal, lift will be in abundance. This was the case and I arrived overhead Balen-Keihuvel. The best bit was I tried a radio call back to Bruggen and got the CFI airborne over Bruggen. I changed the radio to the local frequency and informed them of my intentions. It then was a simple matter of joining the circuit and landing. After landing I was parked under some shady trees less than 100 metres from their Club House. After the confirmation phone call to Bruggen that I was safe on the ground and a call to my wife "Won't be home for tea as I am in Belgium!" With no more flying for me planned that day I bought myself a beer. Silver "C" complete, days don't get much better than this.

Click Here for Part 1