Judith's blog

The forecast was for no tramuntana, but west wind instead. The same cold front that brought all the snow to the UK was due here this evening and there was a weather warning for snow and cold weather. Geoff, who admittedly isn’t a weather guru, assured me that it would be flyable. He had it on good authority from WeatherOnline. I wasn’t convinced, but we had a bet on, so went out to see if we could get a fifth day of excellent conditions at Santa Brigida.

With clear blue skies and little wind here, I was actually more optimistic than my forecasting led me to believe, but spotting the duvet effect at Puig Sacalm gave us our first doubts. It was SE at Les Planes de Hostoles, so we got all optimistic again, but at Santa Brigida the front had come in and it was cloudy and howling from the west.

We did the shopping for tomorrow night’s annual Christmas soiree and then elved ourselves for Christmas. We don’t send cards, so here goes…

See our Christmas video. You may need to wait for it to download before it starts playing.

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Geoff writes: a warmish, sunny day. The forecast was for north, with tramuntana coming in late afternoon/early evening. We decided to take a bit of a chance, and hope that we could fly off the north side of Sant Pere de Rodes before the strong winds arrived. Always nice to land on the beach. Nicky was here, so we had two cars. We left one by the south landing field as usual, and the wind was very light, as it had been all the way there. On arriving at the parking at the top, by the monastery, it was north, but still light. But by the time we had done the 20 minute walk right to the top, it had picked up a lot, and was way too windy to launch safely, especially off a spine back. The tramuntana had arrived much earlier than we expected. So we sat in the sun on the lee side for a while, then ambled down, and went off to the beach for a walk.

Got back home, had a nice meal and lots of cava. So could have been worse – didn’t fly, but had a nice walk in a fairly spectacular place, then a walk on the beach.

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We had a bit of a late start today and planned to have that as a theme for the day. A nice chilled tourist day and then try to fly in the evening, as we thought this would be our last chance to get in the air while here on the island. It seemed breezy from the outset, so we went for breakfast and then headed out for the volcanoes in the Timanfaya national park. Because it’s a national park, there are no laybys to get out and walk around, which is a real shame, as you miss a lot of the scenery if there are cars behind you. We eventually stopped at the camel park and wandered around. It’s a really spectacular place with amazing colours.

Next we went to the visitor centre to check if it would be possible to go on the organised walking tour of the park (the only way you are allowed to walk anywhere there). Every one is fully booked until after next week, but we managed to get some info on volcano walks outside the national park, so that’s the programme for tomorrow.

Although it was windy, the sky was just getting better and better, so we decided to have a look at some flying sites. Two hang gliders were having a wail of a time on El Cuchillo, but it was clear from the village that it was far too gusty for us. The German guides had mentioned a site near Soo to us, so we drove there, but with no idea where the launch is and no other pilots there, we drove on to Famara village, with the intention of having a sandwich and a drink. The beach front restaurants only served full meals, so we carried on towards the north part of the island, closer to the other NE flying sites. On the way, Geoff’s window stopped working. The electrics were bust and it wouldn’t come down. I didn’t think much of it – we had three working windows and air con (not that we ever use it).

We got to Mala and could see the hang gliders who are in the Canarian Hang gliding Open playing about on the ridge, but again, it seemed too windy, with white caps on the sea and strong gusts even at sea level. We checked through the binoculars and there was nobody flying at the Mirador, so we found a sandwich bar in Arrieta. Before we got to eat, Geoff decided to have a try at fixing the window. He did get it moving, but only for it to completely open and stay open. After that it wouldn’t budge. Arrgghh. So we now had a hire car with a permanently open window, so if we did go off to fly, we would have to take everything with us and one of us would be grounded. We had time to take the car back to the airport, and on getting there, unpacked the gliders, cameras, picnic and all the other crap you accumulate on a trip. Just after we loaded it onto a trolley to to take it to the car hire desk, Geoff had one more try with the window. Worked perfectly…

We drove back to Mala and Geoff is under strict instructions not to touch the window buttons and not, under any circumstances, to try to fix stuff that isn’t currently a problem. At Mala we spotted paragliders at the Mirador, so raced up there. Conditions still seemed a bit breezy, but when we got to the front it seemed perfect. The German group of Fritz were there again and despite the calmish wind, they advised us that launch conditions were tricky. The wind was a little off to the east and the laminar airflow was interrupted by the cliff in front of take-off. We got ready anyway, but as we were unpacking the wind started to slowly pick up again. The guys in the air seemed to be having more trouble penetrating and white caps started forming out to sea. We decided to wait a little to check out what was happening, and Fritz came back with a wind meter. Above us at the hang gliding take-off it was gusting 25 – 36km/h. He described the conditions as ‘not exactly the yellow of the egg’ and that you would need to be a really good ground handler to take off in these conditions. On the grassy slopes of the UK I would not have hesitated, but we were standing in a small cleared area surrounded by rocks. Even having to run up the hill with the glider could break your ankles. And the wind was still picking up…

We waited until the last possible launch time and then canned it. Two guys who had top landed gave us a lift to our car and one said that at times he was stationary and had he known what it would be like, he would not have launched.

Out for dinner later, we had loads of touts asking us to come into their restaurants. One even asked us if we wanted to come in and celebrate our honeymoon there. When I burst out laughing, he seemed a little surprised. I’ve worked out a way to thwart them though… You get in there first and greet them with a hearty ‘Hey, how are you?’ in Spanish and by the time they have worked out whether they know you, you’ve managed to get past them.

See photos of today.

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We woke up to a sunny day, but it started windy, although it soon dropped. Nicky wanted to go see some volcanoes, so we went to Croscat, the hollowed out volcano. Next stop was Santa Pau. By this time the wind was picking up again, but Marc confirmed that the wind was light in Santa Coloma. We decided to try to fly at Santa Brigida, but as we got closer we could see the duvet effect, which means high winds. We carried on regardless, but it was clear it was far too breezy and 180 degrees off. Since we were there, we took a walk round Amer village, which took all of five minutes.

Nicky decided to go home, and we drove back to do some work. When we got back to Puig Sacalm, the duvet effect was the biggest and most impressive we’ve ever seen.

See photos of today.

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We opened the conference this morning and were busy until late lunch time. However, we had to collect our car from the garage at some point and the weather was so nice, it seemed only fair that we could take an extended lunch break and go for a quick fly. It was a startlingly blue sky, but very windy in and around Castellfollit. There was some evidence of north/west wind on the way, although it was getting weaker so we carried on driving. We met Marc at Santa Brigida and the wind was on the hill enough for us to drive up to try it out.

It was one of those days when it was different in the valley than it was on the hill, and that concerned us. Not only did the direction in the valley change at times by 180 degrees, but the wind strength was much higher at the bottom than at the top – so the reverse to what it should really be. All this served as a warning signal to us, but Marc decided to try it, but he sunk out quickly and just did an extended top to bottom in the end. We didn’t bother, but rushed home to carry on working.

See photos of today.

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My friends Angie and Royston are on holiday in Barcelona at the moment and contacted me to see if we could meet up, so I got the coach early this morning and headed to the big city. After coffee we walked up to Sagrada Familia, the crazy Gaudi church, but the queues were so long, we decided just to look at it from the outside. Next we thought it would be nice to get away from the crowds and I thought Parc Güell would be far enough off the beaten track for most tourists. I suggested that we take the metro there and then walk back through Gràcia. As we go onto the train I was telling them what a safe city Barcelona is – very little violence, but it’s full of pick pockets and con artists. Right enough, as we got off the train, Royston noticed his wallet had gone out of his front trouser pocket. He jumped straight back on an grabbed the person who had brushed past him. He spotted him throwing the wallet to his partner and raced over to him. Angie ran and held on to the pick pocket. I was so surprised and slow witted that I didn’t do anything for a minute, but then went over to help pick up the money they had thrown down in an attempt to distract Royston and Angie and make a run for it. They did get away in the end – we couldn’t call the cops without a signal underground and we would have struggled to keep hold of them until the police came anyway, but on counting all the money, it seems they got away empty handed. So well done to Angie and Royston for thwarting the scumbags.

That adventure over, we did get to the park, saw the great views of Barcelona, the Gaudi sculptures and houses and chilled out in the sunshine. Far from being away from the tourists, it was pretty busy. Late lunch and a few beers later, it was time to catch my bus back home. It was so nice to spend the day with them!

Geoff writes: a frustrating day for me. It was warm and sunny, but with strongish southerly winds forecast. Checking round in the morning, there was no sign of wind, and I phoned Peter to see if there was any at the coast, but nothing significant there either. So we decided to meet up at Sant Pere de Rodes. Arriving there, though, the balise (wind machine) on top was giving strong northerlies, and the wind in the landing field was from the west, rather than the sea, where it should come from. Although there is a north launch at Sant Pere de Rodes, it was probably too strong, so rather than go up, we phoned Marc to see if Santa Brigida was on – but no, it was too west there, but they were going to El Mont. So, off we went. We arrived there, and there was almost no wind. We were going to drive up, but I thought I’d show Peter the landing fields. In the hang glider field, some friends had just landed, and reported that it was very strong on top, way too strong for PGs, and they had needed people on the wires to launch. So that was that – back home to do some work.

See photos of Barcelona today.

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Geoff writes: a beautiful day, warm and sunny. We did try to go and fly, meeting up with Oriol at El Mont, but decided the wind was too far west and it wasn’t worth the drive up a mountain which is higher than Snowdon. So we went and had a beer and sandwich in Besalu, then back to work. As it happens, it was probably flyable at Sant Pere de Rodes, but the closer we get to the conference, the less time we have for driving around on the off-chance. So, mainly, today was a work day.  And the more work we can get done now, the more time we have for getting out in the next few days before we open next week.

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