One Sky One World 2007

Pontefract Racecourse - 14th October 2007

A dilemma this year - which event to go to. I had the choice of the usual Rufford Abbey OSOW (organised by Midland Kite Fliers) or going a few miles futher to Pontefract Racecourse (organised by Northern Kite Group). Decsions, decsions. In the event I decided to try Pontefract as a) my family were not able to join me and b) the wind forecast was pretty poor (Rufford is hard at the best of times). And so I set off in a rather nasty persistent drizzle and a distinct lack of wind. The journey was made more lively when my car went into a skid on the outskirts of Sheffield caused, I think, to a spill of petrol or diesel on the road which made things rather slippy. Thankfully I didn't crash (otherwise I doubt I would be witting this) and made the rest of the journey without incident.

Arriving at the racecourse at 11:00am in dry but overcast conditions I parked up and went to find the other fliers.... of which there were none. I walked around to see if there was another field I couldn't see - and couldn't find anything. Only footballers and dog walkers. I seriously began to wonder if I had been a super muppet and got the wrong place at the wrong time. I decided to give it an hour or so and if no one else turned up I would go down to Rufford instead. Whilst getting my kite bags from the car I noticed another chap with what looked like a kite bag. Chatting to him reassured me that I was in fact in the right place, just at a slightly earlier time. And so we set up in the far corner of the field and did some kite flying together.

Eventually we noticed activity over by the car park where other fliers were beginning to setup. Wandering over I had a chat with Graham (he who flies-three-kites-at-the-same-time fame) and nodded to one or two other Northern Kite Group (I assume) fliers.

The weather continued dry but feeling damp (if you know what I mean) with a low-but-just-usable wind. Certainly I had no problems flying the HQ Shadow and the Custom Revolution SUL. I even managed to do a couple of back spins on the Shadow - and once on purpose. Must be improving I guess.

During the course of the afternoon I tried various other kites - some worked better than others. I had an excellent time with the Stafford Fighter kites (I flew both of them) - perhaps not with a good technique, but at least I flew and had them under some kind of control. The C-Quad was good to fly - not too much power, but enough to fly well and do the Revolution like things with it. The Freedom 2000 didn't fly at all (but we counted it as one of the kites flown) and the Synergy Deca flew surprisingly well given it's not a low wind kite. Towards 4:00pm the wind gave up completely and so did the kites.

Although there wasn't a huge turnout, a good number of kites were flown or all different types. I especially like the chap flying a 3D pyramid kite - perhaps something I might make for myself sometime. Graham's train of bird kites was especially fetching.

One thing that made me smile is at one point there were the NKG flying mainly single line kites in one corner, myself and another flier doing the trick kites in another corner, and a group of traction kiters doing their thing in a third. Kind of "One Sky, One World, Three Kite Groups". Not far from the truth really.

Kites flown by me:

• HQ Shadow
• Custom Revolution 1.5 SUL
• Stafford Wallace Fighter (x2)
• Peter Lynn C-Quad 3.5
• Freedom 2000
• Synergy Deca
• Flexifoil Fury

Links

• One Sky One World 2007 Gallery
• On Sky One World (UK)