You already have lots of good advice. I'll add this.

Thermalling is the key. Any fool can glide between thermals. If you can
thernal well, you can almost always get high enough to glide somewhere
better than where you are. So, how do you get better at thermalling? Well,
I've noticed that everybone gets a lot better at it once they are out of
gliding range of home.

Bill Daniels