Fiss-Ladis (Schönjoch)

Just back from a couple of days in Fiss-Ladis together with Ruth; so just a short flight from 'Schönjoch'  ;-)

Schönjoch

It's a really nice flight area with (for me!) very conveniently located launches and landings: quite close to gondola stations :-) There is also an alternative launch near the middlestation of the 'Schönjoch-Bahn' in case it should be too windy on top.
XC would be possible direction NW (Switzerland (Scuol) or Italy (Nauders, Watles)) and NE (Innsbruck). Going NE one has to pay attention to LOWI (Innsbruck) airspace; violations will be punished with heavy fines :-((
- but I just flew locally for about 40 minutes...

Main LZ

There is another LZ: 'Ried' at the bottom of the valley (near Inn river), but in summer it is very often too windy after 1200 (till about 1800). But in case you land there, there is a bus station nearby in the village to get back to Fiss.

Pano looking South: Fiss

Pano looking North (launch on the left)

Pano looking NW: Fiss

Summer flying in Kyushu (JP)

Normally, Leanne and Rick Brezina use their summer vacation to come to Europe and fly here. (Rick has been my 'advisor' during my trip to Kyushu in 2019.) But due to the present (Covid-) situation, this year that has not been possible. So they are taking advantage of the relatively good weather in Kyushu to enjoy the flying back home.
Rick is really pushing the limits of flying in Kyushu (and Japan): until today (22.8.) conditions permitted him to make already 25 flights in August, whereof 3 FAI-triangles > 100km! Take-off: Daikanbo and Kabuto-iwa. Kyushu record!

 

Scuol -2

Yesterday PeterW and I had wanted to drive to Disentis and watch a bit of 'PWC-action', but we didn't like too much the fcst - especially the 3-4 hp south overpressure.


(see exerpt from the disentisopen-site below)

20. August 2020

Meteo and preview:

Until noon in the east (Flims-Davos) still cloud fields
1-2/8 Cumulus rising to 3300
Individual overdevelopments possible at the very east
Thermal weak to moderate, relatively ! late start
Pressure gradient increases from 3 to 4hp south overpressure
Wind from here to Calanda:
No or weak valley winds, in Chur ev weak south wind
2000m 15kmh SW
3000m 20-25kmh SW
East of the Rhine the SW wind should be weaker. Davos should have weak, normal valley wind (north) at 15h.


>> so we decided to call it a day and leave the flying to the 'cracks' ;-)

-------------------------------------------

Unfortunately today PeterW had to work again so I went to Scuol on my own: many more pilots on launch! Conditions looked promising, but it took a moment for the thermals to devellop. Some guy flew a FAI-Triangle of 211km!

But I cannot show (even a remotely) similar performance :-(
After about 2 hours of flying I lacked a bit the motivation to continue and landed at Scuol. On the positive side: at least the average speed was a bit higher than 2 days ago ;-)

the castle at Tarasp

Pano looking East: Ftan, Scuol, Inn river, Tarasp

Scuol (Motta Naluns) with PeterW: 71.5km (flat triangle)

I had driven to Schiers, where I met PeterW. We took the train to Scuol and then the gondola to Motta Naluns. Just a few pilots on launch; they launched quickly and climbed away.

PeterW

There has been a little West-wind, so we flew first East to Martina (near the Swiss-Austrian border). Here we turned around and headed West (via Motta Naluns). The climbs (with a few exceptions) have been quite nice (and strong) and thermal tops have been steadily rising (my max alt: > 3700m).

near Martina; looking South: left: Nauders (AT); right: Reschensee (IT)

Heading East: Susch

Conditions looked promising so PeterW and I took a chance of trying to fly back to the car at Schiers via Flüelapass and Davos. We already had discussed this option on the train.

Piz Palü (3900); Biz Bernina (4048), Piz Roseg (3936)

PeterW; Val Susasca and the road towards Flüelapass

The closer we got to Flüelapass, the stonger the West-wind became and as our groundspeed dropped to 15kph we decided to abort this attempt and turn back to Scuol.

Landing at the LZ in Scuol after 3h45min and 71.5km (flat triangle) with just enough time to spare so we could reach the train back to Schiers without having to hurry too much :-))

the flight on Ayvri.com

Schrina

Just a short flight at Walenstadt :-)







>> LZ on the left side of the road -not on the sport fields!!


The harness is set correctly (again).

:-))

Finally - with a delay of a bit more than a week (4 iso 2-3 weeks as 'promised') my new wing has arrived :-))  Today I could pick it up at 'Paragliding Touch and Go' in Rickenbach. Peter has (as usual) done everything possible to have the glider here as fast as possible, but as it had to be sent from Spain by Niviuk, there was not much he could do to accelerate delivery.

Of course I had to fly the wing right away ;-)  A nice local flight from Rothenfluh (1.25hrs)

Rothenfluh: launch(es)

right to left: Rothenfluh, Grosser Mythen, Kleiner Mythen

It flies beautifully; especially accelerated glide is amazing. There has been a small problem, as the wing didn't really want to turn left, whereas to the right it turned by weight-shift only...

After the flight I had my harness checked by Peter and he found that one of the (many) adjustment options didn't have the same setting as on the other side. But that's now fixed and I'm looking forward for the next flight :-)

 

777 Rook2: some statistics:

I bought the wing almost 4 years ago (12.9.2016) and flew it for about 260 flights. Longest flight: 4hr17min and 89kms (from Motta Naluns, Scuol).

It has served me very well during those 4 years and I never had a major problem!

"the King is dead, long live the new King!"

 

La Breya (Orsières/ Champex)

La Breya: a flight area I had wanted to visit for a long time. It's an ideal starting point for a 'tour around Mt.Blanc'.  >>> a flight around Mt.Blanc  (unfortunately not mine...)

Of course I had hoped for such conditions - yesterday 3 pilots did it. But the light N-/NE- wind and the inversion made such a flight impossible today. 

Launch (at approx) 2200m is reached by chair lift from 'Champex Lac', which in turn is reached by car or (in my case) by bus from 'Orsieres' (train station); it offers great views towards Lake Geneva, Verbier, Grand Combin and Val Ferret. There are options for launching direction South and North. South would have been preferable (so we laid out here first), as here we would have launched directly into the thermals but the increasing wind forced us to use the North launch.

Pano looking South: Verbier (far left), Grand Combin (center)

 

Grand Combin (4314m)

South launch (looking North-East direction Verbier)

Looking North towards Lake Geneva

Val Ferret (with Col Ferret at the end); launch (right side)

Overview (looking West)

LZ 'Som-la-Praz' (Orsieres)

Due to the northerly wind the south facing slopes were in the lee and also turbulent. Most (all?) pilots landed at Orsieres (Som-la-Praz) after less than an hour. Today have not been ideal conditions for flying here - as I know by now ;-)

Afterwards I drove back home: luckily without any traffic jams at all :-)

 

 

Good conditions - lousy flying (Plan Praz)

Probably I had just one or two bites too much meat last night for dinner and therefore slept rather badly ;-)

 

I arrived early (for me) on launch at 1000 (that's rather early for me) and hung around for about an hour watching and taking pictures.

Plan Praz launch, looking towards le Brévent

 

I never had an urge to quickly go ahead and get airborne, so I finally launched at 1130. Good conditions permitted me to get above 'le Brévent' in just a short while.

 

le Brévent

 

According to Vincent's advise I tried to fly East first - direction 'Aiguilles Rouges'. Unfortunately I didn't find much lift so I turned around at 'Flégère'.

But I was already too low and also lacked the motivation/ drive to hang-in the weak, bumpy thermals. Landing at 'Savoy' after just 50 minutes... Later (after having packed up), it looked as conditions had improved as quite a number of gliders could be seen above 'Aiguilles Rouges'.

 

If you want to hike up to Plan Praz (instead of taking the gondola) there is a nice track. It's 'just' a 1000m climb ;-)

Plan Praz (Chamonix) - some pix by Vincent

 

Merci Vincent pour ces photos!

Plan Praz (Chamonix)

Finally conditions have improved! Today I could make a nice flight together with Vincent in the Chamonix area: taking-off at Plan Praz (below Brevent) then west to Passy; turning at Varan and landing in Chamonix (Savoy) after 1hr 45min :-)) Rather surprisingly I had been able to keep up with Vincent on the transitions: speed- and also glide- wise.

 Vincent: thanks for showing me the way ;-)

 

 

Launch at Plan Praz

le Brevent

Planz Praz (looking East): Argentiere         

 

Vincent

 

 

heading towards Passy

 

Plaine Joux (Passy): launch (where we have flown yesterday)

 

Varan (turning point)

Heading back to Chamonix...

 

Chamonix: LZ Bois du Bouche (left lower corner); LZ Savoy: field on right side

the flight on ayvri.com

And to finish off a very nice day: a 'typical' French dinner (Cote de Boeuf) in the company of Claire and Vincent.