Judith's blog

Geoff writes: After staying at Andy’s, we headed out to the Peaks again. We thought it would be flyable, but not an XC day, with a reasonable breeze, but only weak thermals. And so it turned out. We started off at Stanage, only the second time we have flown it on a PG, though we’ve flown it countless times on hang gliders. Did the ridge run a couple of time, gaining very little height – less than 200′ ATO – got a bit bored, and went and landed, as the wind was turning further south (Stanage is a SW site). Had a nice chat with Steve Hudson, who runs a para and hang gliding school in the Peaks, and who in fact taught Judith to fly hang gliders many years ago. Judith was thrilled to hear that he now recommends our podcasts to his students.

We then went to Rushup, hoping to do the long ridge run down to Lose Hill, but there was too much west in it for that. People were flying Rushup, but we decided not to bother, and went to do tourist stuff – a walk in the Manifold Valley, followed by a further walk and meal around Butterton, a nice village nearby. All in all, a pleasant couple of days away.

See photos of today.

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Geoff writes: well, from reading Judith’s report below, it seems that Spain was marginally better than the UK! Today would have been an epic day here, except for the howling winds, the overdeveloped cumulus,  the rain. And it was cold.

To be fair, I managed to avoid most of the rain. Having given up the thought of a short holiday for this week (the further north the better, tomorrow, but I need to be at home on Thursday) I decided to go a bit south and see some castles, which I duly did, visiting Grosmont Castle, and the White Castle  (so called, because you can still see some of the white rendering with which most castles were covered, rather than just being the bare rock you see nowadays). I’ve seen the White Castle before, but it is well worth seeing again, if you like castles (otherwise, don’t bother). Both of them are Norman, of course, and built to support their move into Wales.

Following a bit of a walk, a slow drive back via Hay Bluff – a beautiful place, as well as a flying site (but, of course, way too windy for anyone today). No rain until the drive home. 

Judith’s tracklogs from the comp are on our XC page.

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Judith writes: We woke up late after a late night. Despite lots of wave, the sun was shining and we decided to have a look at the Stol take-off, which is where the comp is supposed to be based mainly. The drive up was spectacular. The photos don’t do the place justice. The rock faces are near vertical, the ridges straight and the tops of the proper mountains are still covered in snow. The wind was over the back at take-off, but in the distance we could see lots of pilots doing long, long top-to-bottoms from a ridge facing us. Brendan and I decided to walk back down to Kobarid, while David drove down. We had anticipated it to be a walk of about one and a half hours.

The walk took us along the spine of the ridge, past lots of great thermal triggers and circling groups of vultures. Once we started the descent, it took a lot longer than anticipated. My crappy knees were making me take it really easy and we took nearly three and a half hours in the end. With the high humidity, we were sweating buckets and there were no streams or springs on the way, so I arrived back pretty hot and dehydrated; and certainly in need of a siesta.

People had been flying all afternoon, getting good heights, so Brendan drove David up to the launch at Kobala, near Tolmin. He had a nice flight, getting part way back to Kobarid and back to the landing near Tolmin. Forecast is looking good for tomorrow and the next few days.

See photos of today.

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Geoff writes: big showers during the day, so we didn’t bother going flying, though apparently it was flyable at the Malverns, according to Steve Dean. But not much of a day – just a few small XCs from the Pennines. So, again, we did a few jobs, bought a new car, and waited in for Judith’s parents to arrive en-route from Spain to Ireland.

We’ve replaced the Kangoo 4×4 van with the car version, partly because that will use less fuel, but also because we’re tired of getting penalised because we have a van – the insurance costs far more; typically we pay three times as much for a ferry crossing; etc. There are other reasons too, like it will be nice to have seats in the back, and a new car, but it is just stupid that exactly the same vehicle, because it has no windows in in rear, costs us significantly more in insurance, ferry crossings, etc. Just another scam….

Judith’s parents arrived early afternoon; later Judith and her mother went for a walk along the Mynd, then we all met up in the Crown for a few drinks, then back home for food (and more drinks, the forecast was bad for Thursday). I took some time explaining to Liz why the end of the world was coming soon. Hope I didn’t depress her too much.

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The forecast bad weather arrived today – in spades. There was a thin layer of snow when we woke up and it has snowed ever since. This is unusual – in the eight winters we have spent here, we have rarely seen snow (as opposed to rain), never mind it lying on the ground. I’ve been hoping to get some photos of snow on the cliff for ages, but it’s always gone by the time I get to the bottom of the cliff.

There was about 20cm of snow by 3pm and the power cut out, so we went out to walk round the cliff. It’s really weird seeing Castellfollit looking so different.

Masella has had 70cm of new snow and it’s still snowing hard. Most of the resort is closed due to avalanche risk. My dad phoned to say they had 60cm in Rupit and he is snowed in, occasionally without power. He’s going to use the snow shoes we bought him for Christmas to go to the shops tomorrow. Nicky has had trees down at the bottom of her road and looking at the Roses webcam, we saw snow lying on the beach for the first time ever. The forecast strong wind has just arrived so it seems it’s pretty wild all over north-eastern Spain.

The 7pm forecast has just predicted continued snow throughout the night.

See photos of today.

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I have been wanting to walk at Puigsacalm for ages and today seemed like a really good bet. The weather would be sunny, visibility good and although a weak front was forecast for late in the day, I didn’t think it would spoil the party. We’ve done a lot more flying than walking this winter, so it was about time to dust off the walking boots.

We dropped off the spare car we are baby sitting for my parents at the Coll de Bracons and drove back down to Joanetes to start the walk. Puigsacalm is the highest bit of a ridge near Olot and it is a sheer rock face. You walk in and start ascending. Once you clear the treeline, you get to the bottom of the cliff and then climb up a Via Ferrata. It’s slightly more than 800m height difference, so a stiff climb. Once we got to the top of the Via Ferrata we could really appreciate the stunning views – the Med and Roses, some 70km away was clearly visible, in fact you could have counted the houses. The Pyrenees looked just amazing. We sat down in a sheltered position on the edge of the cliff and had our sandwiches while the wind started picking up. It had taken us two and a half hours to reach the top of the ridge and we decided it would be time to get a move on, if we wanted to do the rest of the walk in a leisurely fashion.

As we emerged from our picnic spot, we realised that the ‘weak’ front was nothing of the sort. In the 20 minutes it had taken us to eat our sandwiches and admire the view, the front had come in and it was snowing heavily in the mountains – and the snow was heading our way.

The route we had chosen was the Cami dels Burros (the donkey path), which is a narrow path right along the front of the cliff, about a third of the way down. We tried to assess if it would be safe to walk it in the increasingly gusty winds, given that the path is sometimes about a foot wide and the drop next to you is 100m. In the end we decided to go for it.

The weather was coming fast, and we decided we needed to be off the exposed side of the mountain, so the second part of our walk turned into something of a route march. As soon as we crossed the ridge and onto the back of the mountain it started snowing. The path back to the Coll (and the car) is wider and easier to spot, so we were less concerned about the snow. It was actually quite nice to have the snow flakes dancing around you while you walked through the forest. What a contrast though. From t-shirts for the ascent to jumpers, jackets and cagoules for the descent.

We ended up walking in the snow for an hour, although the trickiest bit was the incredibly slippy fallen leaves. I mentioned to Geoff that he should try not to break his ankle and this made him trip up about every 5 minutes. After five hours of walking we got back to the car, exhausted, but pleased to have had such a nice walk/adventure.

People did go to fly at Santa Brigida, including Erwan from Niviuk, who texted us to say it was his last flight there, and wanted to say good bye – he’s moving to Morocco to work with his father. Unfortunately, we got the text when we were on top of Puigsacalm, so no chance. Have a great time in Morocco, Erwan, it’s been nice flying with you the past year or two.

See photos of today.

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The wall-to-wall sunshine forecast changed to completely overcast this morning and the pressure charts showed fairly close together isobars, so we abandoned any thoughts of flying and dusted down our cross country skis. Literally. We’ve worked out that the last time we used them was 5 years ago. We were a bit disorganised leaving the house and as we were driving through Olot I remembered that I had forgotten to take my gloves. I have bad circulation in my hands and my fingers usually get really cold, but since we needed diesel, I raided the plastic glove dispenser at the petrol station. Two pairs on each hand and I was toasty – no wind chill and when the sun came out they were like little greenhouses. I’ve kept them for future use.

We got to Croscat and the snow hadn’t melted in the slightest, so we skied round the volcano view point and then headed down to ski towards La Fageda. It took us a while to figure out the bindings again. Geoff had trouble getting his skis on and I was laughing at him until it came to taking my skis off, which I failed to do miserably. Having giggled at him, Geoff was not inclined to help!

As we walked a short way down the road to get onto the track, we could hear this weird flapping noise and on closer examination realised that the plastic sole on Geoff’s boots has degraded and come off nearly entirely. While XC skiing, you lift your foot up anyway, so it was still possible to ski, and we trudged on. By the time we were half way back the other sole had gone too and Geoff was making flip-flop noises with each step. Very amusing.

It was weird being on cross country skis again, after five years of downhill skiing. I can see why we felt really insecure then, with the speed and getting the sensation that the skis are running away with you. I had exactly the same sensation today, but for the opposite reason. I felt really insecure because the skis wouldn’t turn. Still, once we got going and I got back into the swing of it, I really enjoyed it.

Far from it being cloudy and windy, it was sunny with just a gentle breeze and we checked the conditions at Santa Brigida, but Joan told us it was N, so we went to Xenacs instead. Nice little walk, picnic and great views.

See photos of today.

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