Bill Charnock strapped into the glider before his first flight. Photo / Supplied
Bill Charnock strapped into the glider before his first flight. Photo / Supplied
Whanganui Chronicle classifieds team leader and admin manager Bill Charnock went gliding for the first - but possibly not the last - time at Taupō in January. He shares his experience in our I’m new to this series.
I was given a glider trial flight as an early birthday present so on Wellington Anniversary Weekend I headed along to the Taupō Gliding Club to give it a go.
First of all, I was introduced to the pilot of the tow plane and then to Mathieu, the glider pilot, who was just so full of enthusiasm for gliding it was infectious. He gave me a rundown of what we’d be doing and then we went up the airfield to where the glider was parked.
That’s where we hit a bit of a problem. You have to be over 70kg and under 110kg to go in the glider and I was slightly overweight. But Mathieu said we could put some ballast in the tail so we collected six brass ingots and put them in the tail and that was enough to counterbalance my weight.
He got me to sit in the seat at the front of the glider and showed me how to strap into the five-point harness then showed me the dials and controls and gave me instructions on holding the control stick lightly. He said “you’ll be taking control of it later”.
The flight trial fee gives you temporary membership of the Taupō Gliding Club, which includes the first flight then three months’ membership of the club, and you have to take control of the glider yourself at some point during the flight.
So I’m in the front of the glider with the pilot behind and both seats have the same controls. The canopy was closed after the instructions were given and then the tow plane came out, the tow rope was attached and we started talking to the pilot.
We get the all-clear for liftoff so we trundle down the grass runway and the glider takes off before the plane.
The gliding club’s about 1500 feet above sea level and they take you to 5000 feet then release the tow rope and the glider is away on its own.
It was like “wow, we’re on our own now”.
Mathieu was very good and explained everything he was going to do before he did it. So he’d say we were going to bank to the left, then we banked to the left.
A bird's eye view of Taupō. Photo / Supplied
We could see the thermal power station in the distance so we headed in that direction to start with. When we were heading back towards the lake he asked if I was ready to take the control stick, I said I was, and he said “you have control” and I confirmed “I have control”.
I tried banking and then I started to straighten up just as Mathieu started to say I should, then did the same on the other side. He said “you’re a natural”.
He wanted to try to get over Mt Tauhara and go through the saddle but it was a bit cold to get enough lift to get over.
We flew over Taupō's industrial area and you could feel the glider get a lift from the heat rising off the concrete. It must be really exciting when you’re up there on a hot day getting the thermals.
We came back in over the motor racing track where you could see cars going around. I wonder what the drivers thought about this glider appearing overhead.
Mathieu said “I’ll put the air brakes on” and these two things came out of the wings. We landed and it didn’t take that long to stop. We got unstrapped and out, and pushed the glider back to the top of the runway for the next flight.
The glider is attached to the tow plane. Photo / Supplied
It was something I never thought I’d do but I’m really pleased I’ve done it and I’d definitely do it again. For someone who’s never done anything adventurous, in the last three months I’ve gone ziplining and gliding.
It’s just like you and the wind - it’s really quiet up there. We saw an Air New Zealand plane taking off from Taupō Airport and it was on the same level as us. It was quite eerie.
It’s a surreal feeling in the glider - there’s basically nothing holding you up. We were up for about 20 minutes but it felt like five minutes. It went far too quickly.
I’d recommend it to anyone because it was such a neat experience.
