Freesteel Blog » It’s all about the glide angle

It’s all about the glide angle

Monday, August 12th, 2013 at 4:59 pm Written by:

I got another flight off Loser today. One hour. This time among a gaggle of paraglider students on a partly overcast day.

The day started at 6:30am with a drive to the train station to pick up Tom, the latest back-up caver for the expedition. I brought him back to base camp for breakfast, drove him up the hill at 8:30am and walked him half-way to the cave along the path for someone else to collect him as I walked back to the car park to begin setting up for 11.

It’s all so routine now — even the diagonal run down the ramp to take account of cross wind. Lift was weak, but enough to take me up to 2100m before finally settling in for the long slow altitude decline as I tried and failed to get lift off every ledge and cliff forest on the way down. About five paragliders managed to cling on, so maybe its my lack of concentration that always hits me at the half hour point.

Whatever was going on, I eventually ended up here: across a forest, around a corner and above a lake.

Many years ago a friend of mine got to this place, missed the lake and landed in the very top of the trees. The Altaussee fire brigade had to fish her out.

Luckily, 3 minutes of gliding which burned through 200m of altitude got me 200m above the landing field, so a happy ending. I even landed on my feet. Still, I think it deserves a red mark.

Then a local paraglider friend showed me the path back up to the top of the hill to fetch my car. It was grueling. I’ve not recovered yet, but may have to do it again on the next flyable day as all of the cavers appear to be at top camp and not coming down.

1 Comment

  • 1. Julia replies at 15th August 2013, 7:30 pm :

    At least it stopped raining…. 🙂 Wishing you lots of fluffy clouds and fool-proof thermals. You’re lucky not to be at work 😉
    Love to Expo, hope week 4’s gone ok.

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