Cheap German gliding

Andreas belongs to a WONDERFUL club in a beautiful part of Germany
(what part isn't beautiful?). It's in the Rhine valley, although it's
a few kilometers from the river, probably dozens. But it's almost
surrounded by vineyards. Riesling, mostly, I guess.

Of course, I haven't been there in WAY TOO LONG, but my memories are
nothing but the fondest.

Duties for this club member were to help other students launch and
retrieve gliders. We did it all by manual labor, no golf carts or
tractors or cars to go retrieve the Ka7 that landed long down the
runway. Just a bunch of kids getting their daily workout of pushing
the glider back. There was kitchen duty for some members too. I
don't know where this club got all their members, but the ones in the
kitchen knew how to make GREAT meals. They took one look at me and
"allowed" me in the kitchen only once.

Time restrictions on a glider? I don't remember being told, but I do
know when I was flying the K8 or the Standard Astir, there was usually
nobody else waiting, and I could fly as long as I wanted. If anyone
complained, I never knew about it.

I know the knowledgeable members did maintenance on everything, from
the winch to the towplane to the gliders and to the clubhouse. I
always thought the club was pretty self-sufficient. Once, I wondered
why the clubhouse had an "electic" shape. Not square or rectangular,
but many-sided with a lot of glass. I was told the large picture
windows were donated and they built the club house to make use of the
big glass. Oh, it was great!

The club probably made some money on the meals they served, with the
largest meal served Saturday nights and a large meal offered on
Sunday's at noon. Also, they served cake and coffee around 1600 hrs
on Saturday and Sunday. The club did not operate during the week.

As previously mentioned, we payed yearly dues which covered the costs
of winching and flying. Only aero tows were extra. Since I launched
mainly with the winch, I didn't have to pay much extra. This was
during the mid 1980's, when the dollar to Mark hit a high of 3.47:1, I
think. You don't want to know how much an LS4 with a Cobra would have
cost in dollars.

Yea, I'm sure a winch would help our club reduce it's costs. Wish we
had a good one! With a good Lepo!

Ray Lovinggood
Carrboro, North Carolina, USA
Former Member, DJK Segelfluggemeinschaft, Landau

On Oct 8, 5:41 pm, Andreas Maurer wrote:
On Mon, 08 Oct 2007 11:09:46 -0700, brtlmj wrote:
So, given that - after the fees - flying is essentially free, how do
you balance supply and demand? Time limits? Long queues on good days?

Yes - usually there's a time limit per flight, depending on the demand
on the glider in question (usually between on eand three hours). It's
seldom that not all of our gliders are in use.

Bye
Andreas