Learning To Fly Over the Magical Ikara-Flinders Ranges

When Ella took a chance to explore beyond both her comfort zone and familiar SA highways, she didn’t expect to be spending more time in the sky than on two feet.

We Are Explorers acknowledge that this adventure is located on the traditional Country of the Adnyamathanha people who have occupied and cared for the lands, waters, and their inhabitants for thousands of years. We pay our respects to them as the Traditional Custodians and recognise that sovereignty was never ceded.

When a colleague asked me whether I wanted to head to the Ikara-Flinders Ranges in South Australia to attend a week-long University Gliding Club Camp and do some flying, it was almost impossible to find a reason not to go.

‘Gliding should be right up my alley’, I thought, despite not knowing anything about the sport.

Besides my colleague – who I didn’t know very well anyway! – I didn’t know anyone else. On top of that, I was an outsider who’d never flown gliders (a fixed-wing aircraft with no engine…yes no engine…gulp!) before. But, the Flinders Ranges – located around a five-hour drive north of Adelaide – had been on my bucket list for a long time. Adventure was calling, and comfort-zone-be-damned I said yes! 

Grab a guide book: Best Walks of the Flinders Ranges (Enter WAE15 at checkout for 15% off!)

On the morning we left, I loaded my colleague’s car with my bags of camping gear, and hopped in, meeting his son and another mate who were also coming along. Immediately I felt the excitement of embarking on a road trip.

As much as I like flying to locations, driving is so much more rewarding. It allows you to see more of the landscape and makes you work harder to get to where you’re going. I’d driven to Adelaide a bunch of times in the past, so the trip was mostly familiar, until we turned off the main highway to head inland.

Inland Australia is so barren, remote, and all-encompassingly beautiful. I got so used to looking at such flat terrain that when large, looming mountain ranges appeared in the distance – Wilpena Pound, hello! – I almost thought I was hallucinating. 

The Flinders Ranges is the largest mountain range in South Australia, stretching over 430km in length. It’s the only place in the world where 350 million years of near-continuous geological sequence can be seen. And you can really feel that connection to the history of the land while you’re there – the red dirt that seems to infiltrate every crevice of your hands, the blistering heat during the day, and the stunning views of the ranges. The rock layers seem to get more vibrant and almost glow in the dark as the sun goes down. 

Being there made me think a lot about our planet’s geological history, and consequently about the Adnyamathanha people – meaning hills or rock people – who call this land their home. I wondered about their lives here and how many times they’ve shared stories about the formation of these ranges over tens of thousands of years. I couldn’t help but compare it to how I felt in the little family that we’d fostered while adventuring and exploring the Flinders. 

There was something so incredible about the week that I spent there. I met strangers and learnt about their stories and experiences so quickly. With no signal and nothing to distract us, it was like we were transported back in time where word-of-mouth was once again the main form of sharing information. A week ago we were strangers – now we were sharing food, stories, and learning about ourselves in some pretty awesome scenarios, often 10,000 feet in the air! 

Let’s Talk Gliding

You must be wondering how these heavy gliders get into the sky in the first place, let alone how they stay in the sky with no engine. I found out the hard way. After rigging the gliders, and setting up logistics in an airstrip near Wilpena Pound, offers for the first flight went around and me, being…well…me, jumped at the opportunity without a thought.

And with that, I found myself in the front seat of a glider, buckles burning my thighs like a car seat belt in the 35°C Australian heat. This was about the time I realised I’d screwed up and started freaking out. I knew absolutely nothing about these aircrafts. I didn’t prepare myself for the fear of being towed up into the sky by a tug plane – called an ‘aerotow’ – to some several thousand feet and feeling every bump along the way.

All too soon I’d be detached from the tug plane, who knows how high above the ground, and then there would be the challenge of staying in the sky – I’m not selling this sport very well, am I? 

Gliders take advantage of rising air currents (called ‘thermals’) to stay in the sky. You would’ve seen large birds like eagles thermalling to gain height as they bank and circle in the air. For them this process is essentially a reflex, but for us it takes good conditions and skill to stay high in the sky. Lucky for me I was surrounded by experienced pilots and gliding instructors who knew what they were doing. I was lucky enough to have a go at flying myself, which was not ‘just like riding a bicycle’, as one instructor told me!

The first flight up was insane. But getting a bird’s eye view of Wilpena Pound and seeing the differing strata layers of the Chase and Elder Ranges was stunning – I had to keep pinching myself to prove it was real. I kept saying to my instructor ‘This is insanely beautiful’. At one point he stopped responding because I’d exclaimed so much about the view!

After the first flight, we challenged my boundaries once again and did some aerobatic manoeuvres, an experience that I genuinely think of daily. I feel that I should say at this point that these operations were carried out by a skilled gliding instructor, and all abiding by Gliding Federations Australia’s Operational Regulations approved by Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA).

Overall, there was something so incredible about the time that I spent in the Flinders. Although it was just a week, it felt a lot longer and as if my life had changed dramatically in just seven days. These strangers quickly became a temporary family and I was comfortable being vulnerable while learning a new sport and pushing my boundaries. The days were often intense with hiking in the mornings and gliding in the afternoons. We sat around the campfire at night decompressing and sharing stories.  

Now that I’m home, I sometimes catch myself looking at the sky differently. At work, I’ll be staring out the window and see a tiny plane in the sky, and wonder, ‘Where are they going?’, ‘What are they seeing from the sky?’, or ‘What adventures must they be embarking on?’

Glances towards the mountain ranges near my home transport me back to the Flinders Ranges and what they had to offer. When I see birds circling in the sky, I think ‘must be a good thermal there’ and I immediately get transported to the feeling of banking hard in the glider as we gained elevation.

So why am I sharing a short snippet of my adventure in the Flinders? If you’re in the same situation as I was, um-ing and ah-ing about whether you want to go to the Flinders Ranges, perhaps hesitating due to logistics or other considerations, just go! It’s one of those places where you feel like the land is talking to you through the beautiful surrounding landscape and history. 

I’d be kicking myself now if I didn’t just say yes to uncertainty and dive headfirst into this crazy adventure that I’m thrilled to relive every time I look at the sky!

You best believe I’m heading back! See you there?

More Adventure in the Flinders Ranges

• Flinders Ranges – A Long Weekend Exploring South Australia’s Outback
• 6 Best Photography Spots on a Flinders Ranges Road Trip
• Wildflowers at Wilpena Pound in Flinders Ranges
• The 11 Best Walks and Hiking Trails Near Adelaide