On Thursday, Bill and I are heading north for the winter! Well, three days of winter. We’ll be in Philadelphia attending the 2011 Soaring Society of America Conference. Unlike the biennial SSA convention, there will be no exhibitors at the conference, but that’s about the only difference so far as I can tell from the published program. The conference organizers have lined up what looks like a great selection of speakers who will dissert on a wide variety of topics. And every evening features a special event, leading off with the OSTIV session on Thursday evening, chaired by OSTIV President Prof. Loek Boermans of The Netherlands’ Delft University. Danny Powell will deliver the OSTIV talk, which is all about the Lighthawk sailplane. On Friday evening, in a rather dramatic change of pace, we will be entertained by a troupe billing themselves as the “Comedians of Soaring.” On Saturday the conference concludes with the traditional SSA Awards Banquet, featuring Kevin Kochersberger as the keynote speaker. Kevin is a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech and was pilot of the Reproduction Wright Flyer built for the 2003 Centennial of Flight Celebration at Kitty Hawk, NC.

I plan to blog my way through the conference, so check back Thursday, Friday, Saturday (and maybe Sunday) to see what my pen, er, uh, mouse hath wrought.

Bill and I will be  attending talks, breakfasts, luncheons, and promoting the Soaring Cafe, so I won’t be issuing minute-by-minute reports or writing lengthy missives, but I’ll be sure to let you know about anything that we deem notable, newsworthy, or that otherwise piques our interest. I plan to post at least a daily wrapup, but I may also post mini-blogs throughout the day as time and circumstance permit. It should be a fun way for us to escape the winter doldrums and for you to find out what’s new in the wonderful world of soaring!