I just want to say thank you to the Condor2 devs for making a former Lasham boy very happy!
I did my glider training at Lasham in the late 80s, flying K13s (and a single 6 minute flight in a K8), logging about 40 hours of flying (including a flight of over 2 hours off a mediocre winch launch) before Life Got In The Way (spare time, spare money, wife-who-doesn’t-share-my-love-of-flying, etc).
Since then I have acquired thousands of hours virtual flying in FS2004, FS9, FSX and (currently) P3Dv4, and over the past few years greatly enjoying A2ASimulation’s excellent GA, warbird and classic prop airliners, most recently amplifying the immersion many-fold with a VR headset.
I had heard of Condor some time ago but was reminded about it in the current issue of PC Pilot; their positive review led me to hit the Buy button, and I must say I am very pleasantly surprised by the quality of this sim.
One of my favourite aviation experiences thus far has been had over the past few days by flying a simple route (with VR of course) from Lasham to Parham (in “average” conditions) four times in 4 different gliders, each time using the ghosts of the previous flights as company, and each time adopting slightly different (and brave) decisions about minimum altitude to accept before thermalling, minimum thermal strength to cling onto, etc, at the same time practising the techniques detailed in Ken Stewart’s excellent “The Soaring Pilot’s Manual” (particularly the “turning away from sink” and “briefly straightening up in better lift” bits).
The combination of Condor’s quality, me being able to fly against my own ghosts, and the full Oculus Quest VR experience, in Hampshire scenery I recall from 30 years ago has given me the chance to re-ignite (albeit virtually) my passion for soaring flight.
In time I hope to get involved in multiplayer tasks but the only problem I have now is convincing the wife that This Is Not A Game!
Cheers
Simon
