Work
Archived posts from this Category
Wednesday, 10th November 2010
Posted by Geoff on 10 Nov 2010 | Tagged as: Work
Geoff writes: a cloudy day, with some sun. We were considering going out in the afternoon, but Judith went to the doctor to see about her coccyx, which has been paining her for months now. She tried to go in the UK, but there wasn’t enough time – the GP referred her to the hospital ‘urgently’ for an MRI scan, but it took months for her appointment to come up, and when it did, it was after we were leaving for Spain. Here, she went to the doctor, who said she needed x-rays, so then went immediately to the hospital, where she was x-rayed within 20 minutes; then back to the doctor. He has referred her to a specialist, but probably she will be able to get an appointment for that within a week or so.
I think – though I’m not sure – that the reason everything is so much faster in Spain is that there is a much higher ratio of doctors (and medical staff generally) to the general population, than there is in the UK. Anyway, medical treatment here is much, much faster than we would ever get in the UK.
So, we didn’t get to fly, but I did get to do a lot of work.
Tuesday, 9th November 2010
Posted by Geoff on 10 Nov 2010 | Tagged as: Trying, but failing, to fly, Work
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.
Sunday, 7th November 2010
Posted by Judith on 07 Nov 2010 | Tagged as: Work
A dank, grey, miserable day. The forecast rain held off until a thunderstorm started this evening, but it was so gloomy outside, I wouldn’t have wanted to go out anyway. We have tons of work to do and got on with quite a bit of it. We open the JISC conference to delegates in less than 10 days and have lots of the urgent background work to finish so that I can record all the walkthroughs and help files, which use the same screen recording software we use for the paragliding webcasts. I also need to start preparing for a joint presentation I am giving at the conference with James Clay. Live. Over the internet. To potentially 500 people. Gulp.
Thursday, 4th November 2010
Posted by Judith on 04 Nov 2010 | Tagged as: Beach, Work
After Wayne went on Tuesday, I was knackered and slouched off to bed at 10pm and slept soundly until 8am the following morning. Ten hours is nearly unheard of for me and this meant I had a night’s sleep in hand. I went to bed last night and couldn’t sleep at all. So I got up and read the final 340 pages of Stieg Larson’s Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I eventually managed to nod off at 7.30am, after the sun had come up and was awake again from 9am, so I was a little exhausted today. It was another great flying day inland and it was too nice a day to stay indoors for a second day running. After finishing some work, I offered to drive for Geoff, not having the energy for much of a flight myself. We thought Sant Pere de Rodes would work, since the forecast Tramunatana wind was due to cease today and the wind was supposed to turn south in the centre of the day. He would fly and then we would go to the beach for an ice cream and bum around.
Far from dropping, the wind stayed strong north and we switched our radio to the FFVL balise on top of the mountain only to be told it was blowing 24 – 45km/h from the north. We forgot the flying and just went to the beach in Roses instead. I had intended to have a snooze after our picnic, but I got so hot that I went for a swim instead. It was cold getting in, but lovely once you were swimming. It certainly woke me up. The temperature was supposed to be 24C, but a pub thermometer was showing 32C in the sun at 4pm, so pretty hot. Very relaxing day in the end, despite not getting that beach siesta.
Geoff writes: a beautiful day on the beach, and very relaxing, after a morning’s work. We were thinking of packing up and going for a walk, when two people arrived at the beach, got out their deckchairs, and started sunbathing. Fair enough, but this is a beach some miles long and almost deserted (as you can see from the photos). But they sat within ten feet of us. Bizarre….
Wednesday, 3rd November 2010
Posted by Judith on 04 Nov 2010 | Tagged as: Work
Having been out to play for three days, we urgently needed to catch up with conference work, so we had a progress meeting with the conference team this morning and then opened up the conference environment to the presenters. So some tinkering with the conference platform, making presenter requested changes, etc. had us indoors all day, despite the hot and sunny weather. It clouded over a little in the afternoon when I went out to to the weekly shop, but we missed a really good flying day. Got to work sometime!
Thursday, 28th October 2010
Posted by Judith on 28 Oct 2010 | Tagged as: Flying, Work
We were going to work today. Definitely no going out. Far too much to do. Forecast was not great with high cloud predicted all day. So we got our heads down and and did some serious grafting. But then the sky started clearing and the sun was shining and it all looked rather lovely and far too nice a day to stay indoors. I’d done loads… maybe just a quick flight. Oh, go on…
El Mont is the mountain we can see from our house and it looked very inviting, so Geoff volunteered to drive for me, so I could have a quick flight and then we could come back and work some more before meeting our friend Debbi for dinner. El Mont is 1125m high (so higher than Snowdon), has a tarmac road to the top, and a restaurant/bar in a converted monastery next to the take-off. It’s all very civilised. Even a top to bottom takes 20 minutes, so it’s worth going up if you have limited time. In the depth of winter it’s usually just that, a fly down, but as it’s my favourite hang gliding site in Europe, I fancied going there.
When we got to the top at 4pm we bumped into Pedro, an old hang gliding friend of ours, who’s bought a little fold up motorbike to retrieve his car from the top. He says there are now so few hang glider pilots that he had no one to share lifts with any more and had to resort to finding a way to get back up the mountain under his own steam.
El Mont is a great site, but the take off is a hang gliding ramp and it was somewhat like aversion therapy for my recent launch numptiness. You have to do a good launch there – there is no choice. Aborting the launch means landing in the trees and risking an ankle. I did a good assertive launch and was off cleanly first time.
Pedro had said how good the thermals had been earlier, but once I was off there was a solid inversion and the thermals were capped under it. You’d get a bit of lift, but it was too small to turn in. After a few minutes of trying along the top of the ridge, I spotted two birds on the perma-thermal trigger point over the rocks in front. It did kick off when I got there, but it was rough and broken and I didn’t hang around. Instead I headed to the gentle thermal trigger in the gulley in front of the quarry, but it wasn’t to be and I had a nice smooth ride into the valley for a landing in Maia. Not epic flying, but a pleasant way to have a break from work and nice to see the familiar scenery of our extended valley. Geoff came in time to help me pack up and then it was back to work…
Tuesday, 26th October 2010
Posted by Judith on 26 Oct 2010 | Tagged as: Flying, Work
More strong winds forecast for today, but we woke up to an eerie calm and no wind in our valley. Marc posted on the Parapent Girona list that he thought it would be flyable, and I agreed. High pressure and strong tramuntana winds are an excellent mix here and pretty much guaranteed to make for great conditions at Santa Brigida, despite it being a SE facing hill. We had far too much to do to be out for the whole day, so we headed out at 3pm and met Marc in the landing field. We got chatting about holidays and by a complete coincidence, he is going out to Lanzarote the same day as us. We’ve already fixed up dinner!
As we were getting ready, Joan and friends came and five of us had a pleasant (apart from the odd bump) thermal around.
I am having a launch crisis at the moment. I was having trouble identifying what the issue actually was, because one time I stumbled, the next I had the brake wrapped round the riser and braked the glider asymetrically, etc., i.e. there was always an excuse. But today I had an involuntary launch when trying to straighten out the wing and a gust came through. I managed to get away with it, but that’s how accidents happen or mid-airs occur. I sat down with Geoff later and we’ve identified that I am not being assertive enough with the wing, letting it fly me, not the other way round. So my crap stumbled launch probably wasn’t that I fluffed it because I tripped, but I tripped because I fluffed the launch. I’ve been launching really well all summer, so I don’t quite know how this has happened, but I need to sort it – otherwise I’ll break something. It’s funny how you go through phases when everything works well and you’re on top of your game and then one element suffers and it becomes the elephant in the room. Rather than launching fluidly, I have been tense, not wanting to fluff it and that’s not helped. But having someone to watch and help identify the issue is really essential. So I have some work to do…