A great first day at Sherry River with a 38 pilots taking off into a light north easterly.
John Smith led the charge, giving an impressive display of working light lift. The rest of us followed and were surprised with amount of lift around. Most pilots got to around 4200ft above the hill and pushed out to the next ridge in front of take-off to get there next thermal.
The first turn point was Tapawera township and then down to Inwoods and back to Tapawera .
It was impressive to see gaggles along the line of hills to Tapawera. Gliders littered the roadside to Tapawera and down to Kohatu. Two pilots landed on the northern side of Inwoods in not such a pretty paddock. John Smith landed 4km from goal after getting flushed off the hills to the east of Tapawera.
14 pilots crossed the Strait to compete against the best of the south but at this stage it looks like John Smith won the day (unconfirmed) .
Someone was heard to say it was a 50/50 comp. 50 pilots with an average age of 50!
Carbon and aluminium were sacrificed on the to the thermal gods today.
It looks like we are heading up to Mt Murchison tomorrow for day two.
