Take a walk or drive on Bowerman Road in Farmington on any decent-weather day in May or June and you're bound to see someone soaring high above in the sky, essentially harnessed to a giant, colorful kite with outstretched wings flexed wide in the breeze. This isn't some attempt to outdo the Wright brothers or replace the propeller and cockpit; it's the Rochester Area Flyers instructing new recruits on the fine art of hang gliding - or "flying," as it's referred to by those in the sport.

Since the mid-1970's, the Rochester Area Flyers - originally called the Genesee Valley Hang Gliders - have been a loosely organized group that hovers around 60 paying members. The club has a median age of 44, with some of the youngest active members still in their teens and a few members in their 60s that hold down the other side of the age spectrum. It's not uncommon for members to fly off in their own directions on their own time, because the club doesn't have set flight times and locations. It does, however, maintain seven launching sites in the Greater Rochester area (at high peaks in the region such as Bristol Mountain) that club pilots use regularly as a starting place for their in-air journeys.

Hang gliding is one of those sports where semantics and science make it possible for nearly anyone to fly, from 16-year-olds to people in their 80s, like Flyer's trainer Henry Boessl. It's possible to fly long distances because you're not hanging on to, but rather from the glider. A harness keeps the chest area of a pilot clipped to the contraption, allowing him or her to shift body weight from side to side to make turns in the sky and then land.

Pilots use wind to their benefit when taking off, letting it help them generate speed in the sprint phase, and then lift them off the ground at slower running speeds. It's simple aeronautics: speed equals lift off in flying, but since the pilot has to sprint to gain that speed, wind speed is crucial to reduce the steps needed to launch. For example, if the glider takes off when it reaches 14 mph, and the wind is blowing at 7 mph, then the pilot will only have to reach a running speed of 7 mph to lift off. As club trainer Rick Brown says, "anyone can sprint for 5 to 10 seconds," and that's all it usually takes.

The most dangerous part of flying is when you're near the ground, according to Brown. Because of this, club trainers stress how to launch and land in the two-month training program it conducts each year. Starting at the lowest part of the training hill, the instructors work on students' mental conditioning so that they can make those split-second, in-air, decisions needed to avoid many of the tree landings or nose-dives that are likely for newbies. Linda Salamone, another club trainer, explains that once a student completes the training, other club members will "adopt" a new pilot and act as a mentor, which helps keep everyone in the air safe.

A typical training day on the hill starts by doing a thorough check of all the parts of the glider and harness. The students will - from various heights on the hill - launch, make a few 45 degree turns, land, and trek back up for several more runs and critiques by the trainers.

The Rochester Area Flyers offer a "check it out" program, a one-day course in mid-April that costs $50, which gives newcomers to the sport the chance to try flying before investing the money in training and equipment. The full training program, which costs $595 and includes the use of the club's gliders and safety equipment, runs annually from May through June.

The club also puts on year-round activities that new or future pilots can check out. At monthly meetings club members screen and watch flying videos, talk about launch locations, and discuss general club business. Interested folks are always welcome to climb to a launch location with pilots and be a part of the flying from the ground, says Brown. And there's always a need for "recovery drivers," since once someone launches and starts flying long distances, it's quite a hike back to where they started.

rochesterareaflyers.com