Club News

Monday to Wednesday guides/instructors were available but it wasn’t flyable so had to ski instead. Thursday was flyable but no guides! I hadn’t heard from "Pierre" on Wednesday night (who was keen to fleece me and get out flying himself) so I collared him as he was taking my kids off for a skiing lesson Thursday morning (he also teaches paragliding etc etc).

He could see I was keen so he hooked me up with a pair of local surfer dudes in a beaten up old peugeot wearing baseball boots and cycling helmets with goggles on smoking rollups (get the picture!) who turned out to be local la Clusaz mad bad paracrobates with not a lot of english between them.

We met up with some more local "dudes" who all got free rides up the piste after much handshaking etc (no skis required at this stage which was good) for a lovely top to bottom after a difficult reverse lauch (no wind) between two ski lifts – nice!!  This was actually two flights for me and Roddi (their leader and Pierre’s mate) because due to a translation error I landed on the piste rather than at the village which they all thought was very funny particularly as we had to leave quicky – despite the goodwill of all the ski lift people – because we weren’t really supposed to use that particular piste.

Continue reading Paragliding and Skiing in France

Friday looked excellent , but a little windy….it was forecast to die off so I planned to leave it late.  Swalesey had other ideas though and called to say he was going off Sartfell under a very promising sky.  He then called to say he had got just above the Ginger for a magnificent 9.2KM and had gained 600m + ATO.  At this point I agreed to pick him up as the sky looked a little off and us Daddy’s must stick together!  As I drove through Michael I noticed Watty going for it towards Freogane.  He then rang to say he had got to Sulby Reservoir car park for 4.7km…so I decided to go and get him too.

Continue reading Easter Paragliding

Lovely looking day.  Northy was on North Barrule in the morning…he reported very light winds, bouyant…….

When weatherjack starts to get excited I start to get excited.  Very strong thermals till 6pm he promised and so with that myself and Swalesey cashed in some brownie points and got ourselves to the top of Sartfell for a 5pm take off.  The sky had looked awesome all day but now looked cloudless,  there was however a 6mph to 15 mph gusty breeze showing that there was still thermals about.

As soon as my feet left the ground it felt very bumpy,  which was a little disconcerting being so low and so rusty. Up, down, lift, sink …all very small and punchy.  Saw Swalesey take off and do a bit better and then connect with something decent over the Gulley…I headed that way connecting with a steady 2 m/s up trying to stay with the now circling Swalesey…Soon we were circling over the snow covered back of the hill…,, where I fell out of it at 150M ATO.  Swalesey carried onwards and upwards, I headed back to the hill ending up at 100m ato keeping half an eye on the, by now, tiny Phil.

Continue reading Paragliding XC from Sartfell

The Parachute repack is set for Saturday 25th March.  Bill Morris, packer extraordinaire, is flying in for the day to show us how its done.  This is a fantasti opportunity to get your gear professionally repacked and get some real pearls of wisdom from a very experienced pilot – for FREE!  Do not miss it.

The venue for the Repack is the Microgaming Headquarters (the big blue glass building on Circular Road).  Great venue, very posh – definately shirt and tie!

The ‘Awards’ dinner will be on the evening of Saturday 25th March at the Creg-Ny-Baa.  Looking like we will have about 20-25 bods at the moment so it should be a good do.

Gusty 20 plus NNW swinging WNW, too windy for Paragliding but good for Hang Gliding. Mainly 1000′ to 1500′ ATO in company at times of lovely Ravens. Loads of black bottomed clouds but only once got to cloud base at 2700′ ATO with great views of the Isle of Man. (3500′ AGL) and then chickened out because it felt too lifty! What a wimp. Could have gone anywhere but as usual recently too concerned about turbulence and more limited landing options away from the northern plain so just played around out front.

Spent most time over Ballaugh church and way out over the Curraghs. Went to Sandygate/ Jurby crossroads at 4km and back with 400′ to spare. Then to Slieu Curn and back but with lots height lost each way. Top land after 2 hours 45 mins. Not bad though for a cold March day. (Minus 7 degrees at base).

After landed noted Ravens reluctant to leave wall.  Very laid back or perhaps too windy? No of course it was that very dead sheep I had noted 50 yards the other side of the wall before I took off. Its a right mess what with the bloody snout and one eye out. Oh **** what do I do now, its still breathing. Better get a big stone to kill it, but how easy would that be. As I roll it over to see what other damage, it bloody well gets up and staggers off. This is getting worse and I haven’t even derigged yet. Eventually catch it put it in car, blood everywhere and deliver to Farmer Richard who thought it may well survive. Note: In future check all dead "looking" animals before fly.
Dont assume: check.

Tuesday 21st February
Strong gusty 20-25mph NE with some big Cu’s with snow showers heading to the Isle of Man from Cumbria. A bit near the knuckle but glad I did. Too strong to go anywhere and really just gale hanging, yet very smooth. A bit of cloud at times down onto North Barrule at 1100’ATO. Got to 1300’ATo in 20 minutes then 2300’ATO in an hour in amazing smooth gentle wave. But didn’t dare go downwind to Laxey? or Peel? due fear of rotor and dubious landing fields. So again headed into wind for Andreas the out North of Ramsey changed my mind to Jurby.. Nice big flat field there!! 7.2 miles cross wind.

Wednesday 22nd February
13 -18 just North of East. Yep got that wrong. Not nice. 20 minutes up to 700′ was plenty long enuff for top landing.

Sunday 26th February 
20NNE. Initially 800’ATO then 1320′  at  on Glen Duff with a bit of sleet and cloud. Then managed to slowly get back to Lewaige for a really nice smooth 1720′ ATO. Went back again to Glen Duff but only got 830′.  Then landed a bit north of Sulby.

I guess at my age it really is  about time I took Dans advice and swopped the Hang Glider for a Paraglider so I dont have to put up with all these Manx strong cold winds. Then again??

 

Sunday 19th February

A very variable 13-18mph ENE. A bit strong for paragliders like Jamie, Keith and Simon who saw me off. Nice float round out to Mooragh Prom and back with minimal 300 foot height loss. Max 1200′ Above Take Off. Thought I would try for Andreas Gliding Club.  A couple of miles short interesting to be heading at same height and directly towards a sailplane on top of the winch, then for us both to land at same time. Me 1 mile short at Bright Life at 4.4miles. Watty very kindly retrieved me. I found out that they didn’t notice my Hang Glider slightly infringing their airspace while having a coffee with them after. 

 Monday 20th. NNE 24. Max height on hill 1480′ ATO, lost 200′ to Sky Hill then got to 1880′ ATO at Glen Duff. (At long last a decent height gain here). Lost 700′ to Ballaugh only to gain a measly 100′ there. Landed at Windmill Road, The Cronk for a cross wind glide of 7.6 miles. 

Friday dawned with a light SE wind and a terrible weekend forecast for the Isle of Man.  With that in mind I headed to Benni-Phot with the aim of getting to St Lukes church,  as Martin had very kindly offered to retrieve.  Took off a little below the top and struggled to gain height in the 10-12mph breeze.  Eventually got a massive 11m ato and went on glide towards Carrigan.  Arrived there very low and nearly decked it but headed out towards the steeper face and then slowly gained height all the way along the ridge.  There seemed to be more wind at this end so I opted to just go for glide as far as I could go,  needed a bit of bar.

Continue reading Paragliding Benni-Phot

The Manxparagliders 2006 XC League is a friendly competition for amateur pilots and is open to any club member.

Rules:

• This is a friendly competition so safety is the primary concern.  Pilots deemed to be flying dangerously may have their flight disqualified.  Solo flying is not encouraged.
• To qualify as an XC the flight must be further than a ‘Top to Bottom’ (straight glide from top of hill) and have a distance of at least 3km.
• The distance of a flight is measured as a straight line from launch to landing.

 

Checked with the weather man at 11am Saturday morning to find out that it was to be a dull overcast day with a slight chance of some isolated winter showers brought in on the E to SE wind mainly force 3.  The met man had 5 knots East at the Point of Ayre and 9 knots South East at the Airport; I split the difference to about 112 degrees putting the wind straight into Bulgham Bay!  A few weeks earlier I had been hatching a plan to claw my way back to the top of the Cross Country League hopefully getting a couple of km’s up over Jamie’s High score, anyway, in the process I had chewed the fat with Martin about the possibilities of the site, Martin said that having already flown almost to Bulgham from Slieu Lewaigue he thought it would work, albeit that the landing out options if it didn’t work are a bit limited to say the least!

So Christmas passes, the Cross Country league closes for the year (damn it!) but Bulgham still awaits!  So I called Keith to see if he was flying and explained my theory of being able to fly from there to the beach at Laxey in the days wind direction.  One and a half hours later saw the two of us very optimistically leaving our retrieve van on the prom and heading up to the “Big Cliff”.  Once there we had a quick check of the wind at the proposed launch site to find it a very steady 12mph (I think!) and the sky absolutely full of sea gulls all of which were going up or maintaining and none of which were doing any flapping at all!  A thorough recce of all the bomb out options took place (which of course didn’t take long) and revealed that there are basically two; the first and best of which is the top (or possibly front) of the rounded hilltop on the other side of the tram tracks immediately to the left of launch and the other, sink or literally swim, bomb out in the bracken cover flat-ish looking area 3/4 of the way down the cliff immediately below launch with a guaranteed shitty landing and horrendous pack up and walk out!!!! Continue reading Pioneering Bulgham