November 2009
Monthly Archive
Sunday, 29th November 2009
The forecast was for rain most of the day. It didn’t materialise until 4pm but no matter, it was howling as well, so it’s not like we benefited from the dry weather. The plus side is that it snowed in the mountains and we’re hopeful that the ski resorts will open soon.
This is the worst autumn we’ve know for flying weather since we started coming here in 2003. The weather per se hasn’t been that bad, it’s just been too windy, or our work days have coincided with the flyable days. We’ve never had so few hours airtime in October/November. At the moment December doesn’t look too promising, but we’ll see. I’m still hopeful for Christmas day on the beach.
Saturday, 28th November 2009
Judith 29 Nov 2009 | : Miscellaneous activities, Trying, but failing, to fly
The forecast was for windy weather, and so it was. We took our paragliders just in case and drove out to Olot, but could see the cloud duvet on Puig Sacalm and knew it wasn’t worth going flying. Instead we continued the tourist activities. Today’s turn was Vic, which is near Belmunt. We first went there nearly 14 years ago on our first foreign holiday together. At the time we were much taken with the town and tried to persuade my parents to move there when they came to live in Spain. However, being in the central depression, it is prone to strong inversions, which trap fog and smog under it, which can lay over the place like a blanket – sometimes for days on end.
However, when the sun is shining it’s a lovely place and even more improved since we went there all those years ago. With the new tunnel it’s only 45 minutes from home. We’ll go more often, as the landscape changes over the pass (or through the tunnel). On our side it’s very green, on the Vic side there’s more exposed rock and the place looks very different.
When we got to Vic the Saturday market was on. It’s a big affair, taking up all of the Plaza Mayor and the streets around it. We browsed and then walked around the old town.
Friday, 27th November 2009
Last day of the conference and we’re knackered. There’s a (not entirely unjustified!) perception that generally Geoff and I don’t work much, but we started working on this conference in May, and just because we work pretty flexibly, doesn’t mean we don’t put in the hours. So what’s it like running a JISC online conference?
After all the preparation is done, all the content converted and we’ve actually started the conference, we both sit in front of two computers each. We monitor separate live rooms of Elluminate, which is an electronic meeting place, where the presentations take place. At the same time we monitor the Web Crossing conference environment for technical problems and assist the facilitators and presenters. We have to add/change information in the conference, update the live twitter feed and the programme. We are constantly checking our email in case people report technical problems, or have other queries or comments. We process and make available the recordings of the live sessions. We send out a constant stream of publicity and updates on events. At the same time there is a near constant back channel of conversation going on between us and the three JISC conference co-ordinators through skype text. It’s basically communication overload for us. We work with a great team of co-ordinators, Sarah, Ros and Lou, which makes it all a lot easier.
The conference ended up having 444 participants, 1533 discussion postings, seven hours of live presentations (web casts), 21 hours of activities (tours, socials, etc.) in Second Life, and 4 hours of Elluminate sessions for delegates. Plus numerous other non-live presentations, papers, videos, walkthoughs, etc. And a conference blog with 89 posts and 9 videos.
All week we’ve been looking forward to getting out of the house and the first treat is always the big meal we have in the restaurant opposite our house. Jose, the proprietor knows that when we appear looking tired, pasty and hungry in November and February that we have had a conference and he feeds and waters us accordingly. So all week I have been keeping myself going with the promise of roast red peppers, followed by his special steak with roquefort sauce, lashings of wine and ice cream. When we got there, Jose had been taken to hospital – no dinner for us. I was gutted! We were rescued by Cala Paula, who squeezed us in without a reservation. And (the irony!) we’ve sat indoors through 5 days of epic flying weather, enduring texts from friends saying how good the flying is and where the hell where we, only for the forecast to turn rubbish tomorrow! Arrrgggghhhh.
Monday, 23rd November 2009
The conference starts tomorrow, so we worked all day to get final stuff ready, sort out people who’d lost their login information, have final update meetings, etc. It was probably the best day of for flying since we got here. Cumulus everywhere and a good wind direction. If we had curtains I would have closed them.
We’ve been out and bought a mountain of food, drink, chocolate and booze, as we won’t be leaving the house for the next four days. Unless something interesting happens in the next four days, I won’t bother blogging. Roll on Saturday.
Sunday, 22nd November 2009
Judith 22 Nov 2009 | : Trying, but failing, to fly
The predicted cold front went through later than expected, so only cleared us at lunch time, when it went from dull to suddenly brilliant blue sunshine. We went out, but on getting to Olot, we could see the ‘duvet effect’ on the ridge next to Puig Sacalm. Our hearts sank – the chances of actually flying were slim.
Still, Geoff is a firm believer in hope over experience, so we carried on. Of course it was NW and too windy, so we continued our inspection of public improvements of the towns in this area. Today’s turn was Anglès. The first time we went there (14 years ago) it was a dump. The next time we went (about 7 years ago) they were improving the old town and it was a building site. Now it’s much nicer. The old town is a typical Spanish rabbit warren with the old 14th and 15th century houses restored, the roads cobbled and the parks landscaped.
It turned into a gorgeous sunny day, shame we couldn’t get in the air.
Saturday, 21st November 2009
Geoff writes: trying not to do too much this weekend, since the conference proper starts next week – though even the reading week has already been pretty busy, with lots of live events, in Second Life mostly.
We decided to to to Belmunt (Torello). Not somewhere we go that often because it used to be a really long, slow drive over the local mountains. But then the Catalans very kindly built a tunnel for us, and it cut the drive to about 30 minutes, rather than double or triple that. So we decided to try it out – we have flown there before, but not that often. We got there, and as we got out of the car some local pilots turned up. We went to the launch, and we thought it was windy and, possibly, rotory. Some of the locals thought that too, some didn’t. So we made some phone calls, checked out the wind near Amer, and quickly drove back to Santa Brigida – where it was absolutely fine.
Not epic, but pleasant flying, and some more people turned up, having had a top to bottom at Puig d’Afrou.
Joan turned up too – he’d had an accident in summer where his foot was more or less parted from his leg, by a very sharp rock when he misjudged his landing. He’d managed to phone the ambulance, and sent them a picture of the foot – some inches away from his leg – to encourage them to get a move on. Incredibly, they stitched it all back together, and he is walking already, and will probably recover more or less fully. It was good to see him.
In spite of not flying today at Belmunt, we will go there more often. It’s a nice site, and a pleasant change from Santa Brigida. Though of course, it won’t work as well in winter.
Friday, 20th November 2009
We’ve got more flexibility, but not endless time this week. Not enough to go to a site which takes up the whole of the day, although most sites inland were flyable today. So a morning’s work for the conference and then off to Santa Brigida.
We met Jordi walking back up for his car after a top to bottom, so we turned around and fetched his glider for him so he could have another go. It was nicely flyable when we got there and Geoff and Jordi boated about while I had a snooze. I am having an insomnia phase and it caught up with me today – I couldn’t keep my eyes open. Marginally more refreshed, I got ready, launched and easily climbed 1000 feet. The thermals were big, smooth and about 1.9m/s max. I got through the inversion and spotted a group of migrating birds flying along the valley. There must have been about sixty, flying in a big V formation. I tried to fly out to them to have a closer look, but they diverted and I hit lots of sink, so had to abandon chasing them and headed back to the ridge. Shame, as I still don’t know what type of birds they were.
We flew for a few hours off and on and then packed up to rush home to check the conference. 432 delegates now and more signing up each day!