Calke Abbey Kite Day 2007

Calke Abbey, Derbyshire 1st April 2007

The first kite 'official' kite event of 2007 - and the forecast was actually good. The only 'pre-event panic' was trying to find the MKF car park pass, which I was sure I had never received. As a last ditch thing I went through all the MKF Kite Flier magazines and guess what? I eventually found two passes in the very first edition I received back in summer 2001! Good job I never needed them then. So off we set down the M1 with wife, children and mother-in-law (plus loads of kites) in the car. After an uneventful journey (no listening to 'Alice in Wonderland' like the last time in 2005 but the usual wrong turning near the end - a special knack of mine to take the wrong exit off roundabouts) we arrived at Calke Abbey around 10:30am.

We parked up on the edge of the field (but actually would have made more sense if we had stayed in the car park) and whilst my family went off to explore the shop and work out what the restaurant was like I went off and flew a kite or two.

The wind was strong (no idea what it was in the morning but in the afternoon my untrustworthy wind meter thought it was around 16mph - which I'm sure it wasn't) and due to its direction and where I was standing, rather gusty. Seeing a few people already flying Vented Revolutions I thought that should be a good place to start and so got out my trusted Custom Vented Revolution 1.5. Well it was really strange - although I knew the wind was strong the kite didn't. After a while I gave up and reverted back to the standard Revolution which at least flew. The puzzling thing was that the other vented Revolutions seemed to fly without any problem - I can only conclude that my homemade one doesn't have the same characteristics as the commercial models (or it's my skill. Or something).

The morning flying session was short - my family came back to go for lunch early to try and avoid the crowds in the cafe. However this failed - there was a huge queue - but the soup (when we finally got it) was fine - if somewhat expensive.

After lunch on the way back to the car I spent a fair while at the Highwaymen kite stall as they had brought a selection of kite fabric with them - and I was desperate to get sorted with some more materials for kite making. So a good 45 minutes later (and a few pounds poorer) I was set up for a number of projects.

Anyway the flying: I got the kite bag and went further up the field to get away from the trees in the hope the wind wouldn't be so gusty and 'strange'. Which proved correct - so out came the homemade vented Revolution and I spent a happy time playing around with that. I ended up have a couple of nice chats with some other fliers about Revolutions and how good they are.

As the wind wasn't dying down I didn't dare get the Delta kites out (even the Benson Minigem) - so the other higher wind quad lines got an airing - the Papillon 4 followed by the Freevol LX - which were both fun to fly (provided a gust doesn't get behind them and knock them to the ground - which both are prone for). As the afternoon wore on people went home so I had more space around me. Spying an old telegraph pole nearby caused me to go and play landing the Revolution onto it - which would have caused daughter No. 1 much embarrassment if she had seen me do that (I would have had cries of "Dad! Stop showing off!) but I was happy messing around - and I was even more happy I didn't get the kite stuck up the pole. Definitely one of the nice things about the Revolutions - you can make obstacles part of the fun.

Eventually 4:30 arrived, which was the time I had agreed to pack up and wait for my family to return form going around Calke Abbey itself. But as no family was forthcoming (they were still in the hall itself) I gave the Benson Minigem a go - the wind was at the limit with what I was happy to fly in (I didn't want to break bits off it!). Not much in trick flying, but lots of fun, fast flying.

And so with one last trip around Highwayman (where I debated, and decided against, buying some spare spars for the Trident - which I regretted as then I broke one the following day) it was time to go home.

An excellent day all in all - and one the kite traders must have loved given the number of people I saw wandering around with broken bits of kite carbon.