About A470 Soaring


This is the blog for a few guys who spend their time flying radio controlled gliders, or slope soarer's, from the many and varied slopes around SE Wales.

This usually begins at the northern end of Cardiff, driving north up the A470 up to the Heads of the Valley's and the southern fringe of the Brecon Beacons. But the A470 road continues its windy way all the way to N Wales.

There are many slopes available for most wind directions, the most famous being the area between Nant-y-Moel and Treorchi known as The Bwlch, which has some of the best slopes and flying in Europe with many F3F competitions being held there each year and visited by many fliers from Europe and around the world. At 1500 feet (450m) above sea level, there is usually more wind than not, and certainly more than at sea level.

If you require any further information, are new to slope soaring or are visiting the area, please contact Steve at steve.houghton59@gmail.com . I look forward to hearing from you.

Take a look at Page 2 (look below and to the left here) for Google maps of our most popular Flying Sites.


Thursday 18 October 2012

Wings Over Wales

Saturday 12th October 2012 I met up with Mark in the layby for the Ice Cream slope at The Bwlch just as a couple of lads were walking back from the slope. They were visitors from Wiltshire and were just having a break from flying for 10 minutes, so Mark and I went on towards the slope.

The weather was great with the sun shining and big, white, fluffy clouds drifting by in the 15mph ish northwesterly wind and Mark launched his new, Ron Broughton design Odyssey plank.

Chris turned up with his Odyssey along with the Wiltshire guys and we all had a great time flying until at around 2:30 when the wind swung to south westerly and rain clouds loomed overhead.

Saturday 6 October 2012


Phil decided to get himself a Speedo as he's been watching me fly mine and seeing how much fun I've been having with it.
Last Sunday wasn't the best day for a maiden on the Meio with drizzly, misty showers and a 25 mph south westerly blowing, but this is what happened. Don't forget to change the video quality to HD.