Dumanli Dag adventure - 2nd June.

8.5km north of my dad's house in Islamlar, Kalkan, there's a 1956m mountain called Dumanli Dag which you can see clearly across the Xanthos plain from Babadag, 30km away. I'd always fancied flying off it and landing next to dad's (at an altitude of 550m).

Dumanli Dag and Dad's house

There's a track up to the top where there's a forest fire watch tower, manned throughout the summer. Annie, dad and I had attempted to drive up the track last year but it was too rough for the rental car and we backed off. This time we had a rental 4 wheel drive (a little open top Suzuki - 20 quid per day) and perfect clear, calm weather. So we set off from Xanthos Villa at 10am and completed the winding drive to the top no problem, enjoying spectacular views of the easterly valley on the way, really appreciating the jeep's performance. A fire-watcher with a big pair of binoculars (possibly posted up there for the entire summer) greeted us at the top, and invited us for a tea which we declined, being pressed for time. There was some cloud building at our altitude. A dust devil also spun right past us as I was trying to decide which way to take off in the zero wind conditions. I decided to forward launch down the dirt road in the opposite direction from the heading I wanted, and then do a U turn to the left once I was in the air. This worked well enough - although it was a fairly committing take-off.

The flight down was uneventful. I tried finding thermals but the air was dead, except for a little activity caused by large valleys here and there. 30 minutes after taking off I had landed next to dad's as planned without any incident. A good feeling of 'job done'! I took some shots of the house from the air at a few hundred feet for the record.

Dad's place has the wing shadow over the pool

Next mountain to fly off: Akdag, 3000m!