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Gliders can hit speeds of 180mph, travel over 1,000 km in a day and reach heights of almost 40,000 feet - little wonder gliding is considered the ultimate free flying experience.
LINDSAY JENNINGS has a taste of the high life
I'VE put on my parachute and pulled the straps tightly and, somewhat unflatteringly, around the top of my legs. I feel like a blonde Ninja Turtle, but I'm sure I won't be worried what I look like if I have reason to tug on the metal D ring as hard as I can.
"We keep this all nice and tight, " says Andy Parish, deputy chief flying instructor at the Yorkshire Gliding Club, as he settles me into the front seat of a DG 1000 glider. "It's good, especially if we're doing any aerobatics."
I can't tell if he's joking about the aerobatics thing but one of the guys from the club chips in mischievously with: "Have you ever flown one of these before Andy?"
There's a lot of camaradarie at the club, which is based on top of Sutton Bank, near Thirsk, in North Yorkshire.
Andy hops into the seat behind me and runs through the safety checklist. I'm normally rather claustrophobic but it's roomier than I expected in the front seat and, as we taxi down the grass runway, bobbing along behind the motor plane or 'tug', I feel a surge of excitement. The line taut, we're soon soaring into the sky, climbing higher and higher above Sutton Bank. When the cows look the size of ants and the houses like they belong on a Monopoly board, Andy releases the tow line and the glider sweeps noiselessly to the left. He points out Helmsley, the vast expanse of the North York Moors...