November 2008
Monthly Archive
Sunday, 9th November 2008
We got up early to watch the paramotors coming on their excursion to Castellfollit, and we got all exited when we saw five balloons on their way to Besalu. About 25 paramotors did come over the house, but rather than buzzing the cliff, they were about 500′ above us, so not very exiting.
Besalu is below El Mont, and that is where all the free flyers at the paramotoring festival were going. We considered it too, but you can only launch one at a time and the car park would be so full that Geoff would have no place to rig the hang glider. The alternative plan was to meet Vincent at Sant Pere de Rodes. On the way there we could see low cloud and Vincent confirmed that the tops were all clagged in. I’m sure it did clear as the day went on, but we’ve done so little flying recently that we turned around and went to Santa Brigida. On getting to launch we met our friend Udo from Clear Skies Paragliding, who had dropped off some customers at Girona airport and was waiting for the next lot to arrive. We haven’t seen him for eight months, so there was plenty to catch up on.
We all flew. The first flight had the odd bumpy moment, but at 3.30pm it smoothed out and what felt like restitution (with the odd thermal thrown in) set up. It was silky smooth and you could fly way out into the valley. Santa Brigida is one of those magic mountains, which works most days, but one of the things it is really good for is the evening flying you can get. At one point I was lying back in my harness, arms behind my head, just flying around chilling out.
Saturday, 8th November 2008
We closed the conference down at 8.30am and we emerged into the sun like a couple of squirrels after a long hibernation. It felt like that anyway. The forecast wasn’t quite as good as it had been but the key thing was to get out of the house (in the end, it was warm and sunny after all).
On the way out we could see lots of cloud and wind so went for the easy option: Santa Brigida. Despite the wind in the landing field it was light on top, so I took off and the conditions were ‘interesting’. Where you expected lift (and could see wind in the trees) there wasn’t any and where you didn’t expect it, you got hoicked into the air. It was very thermic and quite rough in places. We rarely fly at Santa Brigida when there is cumulus, but it started to form out in the valley, so I flew out and connected with a nice 2.6m/s thermal which took me up to cloud base. I flew out into the blue to stay out of the cloud and stayed in the lift band and flew some way up the side of it.
Geoff was lower and found it quite rough, so we both top landed. We’re so tired from the conference that we both snoozed for half an hour until Felix arrived and we all flew again. Conditions were smoother and you couldn’t get as high but you couldn’t get down either. We hadn’t eaten since breakfast and I tried several times to top land, but always ended up 200 feet higher than when I started my approach. Eventually I could barely hear my vario over the noise of my grumbling stomach, so I decided to bottom land, and Geoff could pick me up on the way to the snack bar. I eventually got to 300′ below take off, and hit yet another thermal, so admitted defeat, thermalled back up and top landed.
Hunger sated, we headed for Besalu and the paramotor festival. We bumped into lots of friends we had not seen since arriving in Spain, including Vincent and Carles. The first paramotor arrived at 6.45pm and the spectacle started at 7pm, with fireworks. It must have been amazing for the guys to see the fireworks from above, with the river and the bridge below. Ramon Morillas did some acro and although they did not have permission to fly below 40m of the top of the bridge, they flew within feet of it. The closest buzzed us about 10′ above our heads, to great cheers and applause from the crowds. Health and safety? This is Spain!
Friday, 7th November 2008
Judith 07 Nov 2008 | : Boring stuff
Last day of the conference and we are completely exhausted. It’s been the busiest and most complex conference we have ever run in the seven years we’ve been doing this work, not least because of the wide variety of technologies we’ve deployed. But at least we’ve been able to work with a great team of people to put it together.
Tonight we are having some time off to go to the restaurant opposite for the biggest steak they can sell us and a couple of bottles of wine. The forecast for tomorrow is excellent and we are going straight to the nearest hill. We need some air after the week we’ve just had!
Thursday, 6th November 2008
Judith 06 Nov 2008 | : Boring stuff
This is what we do when online conferencing…
Two computers each, talking, chatting, emailing and monitoring the techie side of things, all simultaneously.
What’s missing from this photo is the large glass of gin and tonic. That is added about 7.30pm.
Wednesday, 5th November 2008
Judith 05 Nov 2008 | : Boring stuff
More conferencing all day, however, we got an email from the club with something to look forward to. We were going to go away for the weekend to get away from the computers and have some time away from the house, but there is going to be a paramotor festival in the next village at the weekend.
We’re not wild about paramotoring, but the weekend includes a fire spectacle on the bridge in Besalu, a night flying display by Ramon Morillas and possibly 60 paramotors buzzing our house on Sunday morning. Wouldn’t miss it for the world!
Tuesday, 4th November 2008
Judith 05 Nov 2008 | : Boring stuff
I said we were not going to blog, but something interesting did happen today. We were glued to the computers most of the day and night, but at 4pm I saw something outside the window in my peripheral vision. It was a paramotor buzzing the cliff, flying right outside our window. We occasionally have balloons in the valley and we go out and wave to the passengers, but it was the first time we have seen paramotors so close to the house.
Monday, 3rd of November 2008
Judith 03 Nov 2008 | : Boring stuff
Typical. First sunny day in a week and the last day we could go out until Saturday and I am ill. We spent a frantic day finishing off the final touches to the conference, and are all stocked up with coffee, milk and mounds of chocolate, so we are ready for the big switch on tomorrow.
We won’t be blogging for the next few days. What’s there to say about spending 17 hours a day in front of the computer?