Early and Cold Winter 2016

While we were enjoying the Mexican sun in early December the South Coast got hit by a winter storm. The spouses of  our flying friends were stuck at home shoveling snow. First ski reports came in at the end of October, though we waited until late November until we got our skis out. Nothing new as this happens frequently. But usually several juicy pineapple expresses take care of the snow and December and January are relatively dry. Not so this year. 2016 brought an unusual cold spell of 6 weeks frost that lasted until mid January.

Valle de Bravo - December

We are just back from a great week of flying in Valle de Bravo. Our third time there and my favored visit. At times I took advantage of flying with a Norwegian group and their guide Ronny and especially of his efforts to help the stragglers in his group to keep up. He spirals down to the low pilots and leads them to the next thermal while the rest of the group waits up high. Very nice!

It was my first flight over Espina, Magey and Divise and all of this on my first long flight of the week. And I made it back to the lake and Valle de Bravo on 5 out of 7 days. So much fun!

Above El Penon launch

Cloud street on the mesa

Heading to Avandaro Lake (Valle de Bravo town is on the right shore)

My tracks of the week

Our accommodation was very cool too; bit of an uphill hike from the LZ but much quieter than the places we stayed at before and rather 'whimsical'.

Rain Record October

Usually our Westcoast fall brings pleasant weather, Indian summer or Alt Weiber Sommer for the Germans. Not so this year! It was apparently the rainiest October on record, only 3 days without rain (28 days with rain out of 31 days). Not holding my breath that November will be much better. Time to make some travel plans! Mexico sounds better and better.

Fall Elk Flights

Despite all the rain we got a few nice hike&fly missions in. Its great to be able get out whenever the weather is nice (and not to be limited to weekends).

The red 'v's indicate our launch sites, the right most is Elk mountain.

Benny to Woodside

Surprisingly good conditions for October made this nice little XC flight possible. Another first timer for me and only my third or fourth flight from Mt St Benedict. I was struggling a bit to get up and well behind three friends (MON, James and Paddy) but this way I avoided following them into the bowl between Deroche and Sasquatch mountains which got progressively darker and wetter. Instead I finished along the edge of the clouds with a smooth 10 km glide to Eagle Ranch.

Doarama Flight Display

Click on link above for the virtual flight

Europe Fall - Leipzig, Tolmin, Bassano

This year we decided to combine the yearly visit to Germany with a trip to Slovenia and check out Tolmin and Kobarid. The cities are in the Julian Alps, the eastern extension of the Dolomites. As the name suggests, it’s a limestone/dolomite range. The Soča river in the main valley is well known in the kayaking world for its turquoise whitewater. The highest peak is Triglav (2864m), closer to the flying sites Krn (no idea how to pronounce it… 2244m). Cloud base never got above 1800m for us and we didn’t see much of the big mountains. Nevertheless the flying was nice and good enough to go cross country (+60km for Pete with a little cross border flight into Italy and +40km for yours truly) from the Tolmin launch called Kobala. Sadly a front rolled through the Alps and strong west wind put an end to the good conditions after only two days. We didn’t get to launch from Stol (the launch near the town Kobarid) but got to check it out from the air when we flew over it from Tolmin on the days before.

Too much wind in Tolmin had us search for other flying sites. The go-to bad weather spot is Bassano in Italy on the southern edge of the Alps. But since many pilots are looking for a fly-able site it makes for dense traffic and fish bowl style flying. Just like on our first visit a couple of years back the fishbowl was very murky and the air so hazy that we could barely see the ground. The south wind may be the culprit as fellow Canadian pilot Daniel suggested. It didn’t help the crowded feeling that many pilots had their own opinion where the best lift was and different interpretations of ridge-rules. After getting tired dodging other paragliders and hangliders I tried my luck out front and found a nice thermal expecting everybody to rush over to join. To my surprise I was still alone after a 400 meter climb. Even the pilot next to me kept circling patiently in his zeros below.

On the way to back to Munich we stopped at Werfenweng near Salzburg to fly Bischling. A fun flying site! It’s like small Dolomites with limestone cliffs and towers of the Tennengebirge 5 km across from launch. Although it is a popular site most of the pilots are students in training who launch, land and return. That makes for good entertainment over a coffee from the restaurant next to launch while waiting for conditions to turn on.

Some of the great things about flying in European are gondola access, restaurants at launch and landing, lots of flying sites; but the crowds can be a bit annoying. And with the end of the tourist/hiking season many gondolas shut down or operate only on weekends, so it’s a good idea to check before making plans. There are no lifts in Tolmin and Kobarid (or in Bassano). Vans drive up to launch from the LZs. The vans can be busy and it helps to call ahead to reserve a spot. For weather forecasts we used Wetterfex.com.

Tatshenshini - August

We finally got to paddle our whitewater kayaks again, on the Tatshenshini River from Yukon to Alaska. It was our second trip on the Tatshenshini and the third on the lower part, the Alsek River. We spend 12 days with friends from all over the Westcoast (Vancouver, Trail, Seattle, WA Pocatello, ID and Eli, NV), most of them in rafts (so there was plenty space for our food and gear).

The Tatshenshini runs through the most glaciated mountain range of the world outside the Polar region. The high point of the journey is Alsek Lake with its many icebergs. The bergs are very scenic but may also pose a problem. Moved by wind they can block the route through the lake. Good thing that on our way down the river we met an old friend who was guiding a commercial trip. He told us about a different route to avoid the bergs.

Pilot Hans from Yakutat brought us back to civilization to Haines, Aaska with his Turbine Otter (a bush plane). Although bad weather was chasing us this was our most amazing plane flight so far, with stunning close-up views of snow covered peaks and endless valley glaciers below. The drive up to the Yukon was an adventure in itself; I watched a lynx, got stopped in the middle of the road by a bison herd, had a great northern light photo session and of course there were countless road-side bears (I stopped counting at 20).

100 Kilometer! (June 21)

My first flight over 100km! First time all the way to Spindrift and the Meager Valley. Almost all of it I flew alone. Air was a bit rough in spots and I never got over 3000 meter. It took me 5 hours (4:58) of flying and seemed a lot of work!

Whistler to Pemby - June 26

On the drive to Pemberton we heard that Mackenzie launch was closed due to a wildfire. So we stopped in Whistler and hiked up to Rainbow launch. Found plenty of lift and made our way to Pemberton. Good climbs on the three ridges between Whistler and the Pemberton Valley. First time for me (and James) to fly this line! Arrived over Miller Ridge in time to watch a gaggle there setting up and take off.

Iceland Airtime

This was primarily a sightseeing/photo trip but since Iceland Air allows 2 full-size pieces of luggage (yeah!) why not bring our wings?

Description of all the awesome landscapes, waterfalls, fjords, volcanoes, hot springs, puffins, guillemots, bird cliffs, lambs and horses will be in a different place; here just a short account of our flying activities.

First flying stop was Vik where we met up with Grampa Dave, a Pemby (or rather: international) pilot. He and his Vik pilot friends welcomed us warmly with a party until 2:30 AM – rather hard to know when to go to bed when it doesn’t get dark - and introduced us to one of their local flying sites, the cliffs above a group of sea stacks called Reynisdrangar. There we enjoyed a long ridge soaring session above countless nesting fulmar birds and similarly countless tourists.

Iceland’s landscape looks like a dreamland for paragliding but many of the great-looking hills and ridges line up the wrong direction and the wind is 90 degrees cross to the take-off. Not a big surprise considering how winds should behave in a fjord and most of Iceland’s coastline is made up of fjords. In addition winds were often much too strong and gusty for flying and changed in a hurry.

We had another sweet ridge soaring session in the desert/moonscape along the northern ring road between Egilsstadir and Lake Myvatn and also got the wings out for a short hike & sledride, a low dune soaring session and some kiting. So one could almost call it a flying trip!

While Iceland wouldn’t be first on my list for a paragliding holiday; getting in the air above some of the amazing sights was definitely one of the highlights of the trip. There is a cool app/online site for wind directions and flying sites (http://hopp.la/ice/) but beware, the wind speeds are in m/s. For km/h multiply by 3.6 .

Flying near Vik

Along the northern Ring Road

Blanket New Year 2016!

What a great way to start 2016 with a week of back country skiing at Blanket Glacier Chalet (across the valley from the Revelstoke ski hill). Amazing powder snow, stable avalanche conditions, great weather, a super group to ski with, yummy food... and over 10,000 meters climbed during the week. This was our fourth ski trip to Blanket and just like the ones before it did not disappoint.