Glider Flying almost as good as a waribrd

[Bill Greenwood]

After Geneseo, I took a couple of days to see the area.Drove to Niagra Falls, go a quick helicopter flight over the river then walked to the overlook park. Good, worth doing. But the best thing I did was go to Harris Hill, where gliding first started in US, just north of Elimira between it and Corning, NY. I never knew God gave Yankees such a beautiful place, it's not all like Newark or NYC. There is a small flat area on top of a hill, right next to a park, a 1100 foot paved runway and a grass one next to it. Rides are $65 for a 2-33 trainer( I prefer the vintage one) and $75 for the Astir 21, very reasonable. My instructor was a nice young guy, Sam. He did the takoff, then let me fly the tow and all of the landing. My landing would have been about a 9, but I had the spoiler handle pulled so far the wheel brake was slightly on. I wish now I had stayed and really perfected it for a few more flights. EVERYONE should go there and take a flight. It is beautiful and cool in that historic setting. An A plus experience,some of the most fun I have ever had in aviaton. You can bring a lunch and picnic there to watch or get a sandwich at the concession stand in the park, right out of 1960.

[Jerry O'Neill]

Bill;
I'm so glad you got to experience a little of the Northeast! Upstate & Western NY are extremely beautiful and the Finger Lakes are fabulous.
I never realized it myself until I started to drive to Geneseo in the 80's.

I've had the ocassional flying days like you described that were just perfect in almost everyway. Fond memories I always look back on and always pray for another one in the future.

I didn't go to the show, but maybe you'll get a chance to come back this way someday.
Blue skies,
Jerry

[daveymac82c]

Hey Bill,

That's awesome that you went gliding! I learned to fly on gliders in the Air Cadet program here in Canada on the 2-33's. We have a fleet of 12 of them now I think. That's just in the Pacific Region (British Columbia). My first solo was a brilliant experience. Gliding was so much fun and so peaceful that I just had to get into instructing on gliders, which I did for 2 years.

Anyways, I'm glad to hear that you had a good time and that you got to fly most of it.

How do you like those spoilers? I love them and when I started learning to fly powered airplanes I couldn't understand why they didn't have them too.

Cheers,

David

[AeroTRrat]

Gotta love the craddle of aviation... how many are there anyway?

I have a cottage on a little lake in the Finger lakes region. It's close to Hammondsport, the Glenn Curtiss museum and Watkins Glen race course. Many mornings I'll be fishing and see an ol J-3 fly the lake, down low. And a B-17 used to opperate out of the Warplane museum in Elmira.

Plus the area is still full of farmers grass strips. It's worth drivin slow to peek into the old hangers. Penn Yan, on Keuka lake, usually gets a B-17 stop or an air show in the summer.

The Finger Lakes is one of the nicest places on earth and most folks overlook it. Definately worth looking around if you ever get close.

Dave

[Edward Soye]

Bill,

Glad you managed to get up to Elmira and get some 2-33 flying in. I enjoyed our chat about gliding over lunch at Geneseo last weekend.

Hope you had/have a safe flight home.

Cheers

Ed

[Connery]

Flying gliders is a lot of fun. While in the Air Force I had ridden in a couple of the base flying club's Cessna's, but it wasn't until I was stationed in the UK that I found the joy of flying gliders.

I was stationed at RAF Croughton and heard about a group of RAF chaps that ran a glider club over at RAF Bicester. I checked it out and took a flight. Wow!! what a blast. The feeling of flying with no engine noise was just incredible. Most of my launches were by cable tow, but a did have a couple aircraft tows as well. All of my flights were with an instructor, but the last few he never touched the controls. I only managed a few hours of flight time before I rotated back to the states, but it's definately something I'll alway remember.

If anyone get's a chance, like Bill said, you should take a flight in a glider. It IS amazing.

[Obergrafeter]

One good thing about learning to fly a glider, when you lose an engine in a light plane its' not so scary. Every glider flight is an engine failure.