Arosa (Nov / Dec)

Several nice flights in Arosa, some even with some thermal assistance (17./18. Dec.)! On most days I made a flight to Arosa and then another one to Chur (and back to Arosa by train).

Golf course Domat-Ems

Moderne Lichtbauweise - ein Workshop in 3 Teilen "Leeloo"

>>> for once a blog entry in German, as all 3 videos are in this language only - sorry! <<<

 

Im November hat Michael Nesler ein 3-teiliges Webinar zum Thema "moderne Leichtbauweise" durchgeführt. Michael ist ua auch bekannt als Konstrukteur von (SWING-)Schirmen, Sicherheitstrainer und Autor von vielen Artikeln rund ums Thema Gleitschirm.

Bild aus dem Leeloo-Flyer von Profly

 

 (den ganzen Prospekt findet man hier)

 

Die Aufzeichnung des ersten Workshops "Moderne Leichtbauweise" hier:

     https://vimeo.com/478391007
     Kennwort: Leeloo@2021

     >> Link im Browser eingeben, dann erscheint eine fast weisse Seite, wo nach dem Passwort
     gefragt wird; erst danach Weiterleitung zum Video.

   
  Die Aufzeichnung zum zweiten Workshops "Wie sieht ein Schirm aus, den ein Designer für sich
    selbst baut" hier:

  https://vimeo.com/user3569673/review/481132432/47298e5d47
    Kennwort: Leeloo@2021


  Die Aufzeichnung des dritten und letzten Workshops "RAST V3: Fakten und Mythen" hier:

  https://vimeo.com/user3569673/review/483768124/451f849124
     Kennwort: Leeloo@2021

>> ACHTUNG: die Videos sind nur bis 30.11.2020 verfügbar!!

 

>>  Ebenfalls ansehenswert: "das Überflieger Projekt  - werde dein bester Pilot" Hier wird das Thema "Gleitschirmfliegen" nicht nur von der rein technischen Seite her besprochen, sondern auch das Mentale wird beleuchtet.

Arosa (more)

(Saturday) ...a promising looking morning (pix from webcam on Weisshorn at 0730) 

The fresh snow from the last days had already been machine packed, thus offering a perfect 'runway' for launch in the E / NE -Wind.

Weisshorn: looking back to launch

The first flight was just a sledder to Arosa. The second flight (to Chur) could be extended by about 15minutes due to some reduced sink and some weak thermals in Chur :-))

(Sunday) Same 'program' as yesterday ;-)

 

Alp Scheidegg, Arosa

Thursday: Half an hour of 'autmn' soaring at Alp Scheidegg (with toplanding). Just caught the right 'window', as before the wind was a bit too strong for me and later it was dying...

Säntis

Lake of Zurich

Mythen

Friday: looking pretty promising. As luck would have it, I didn't have to wait even a minute at 'Hüebli', where I had parked my car, before another pilot stopped and offered me a ride :-))) Thanks Fritz!! 

But It turned out that conditions were quite different to yesterday: wind more westerly and less consistent. Just a few pilots could make longer flights; most just concentrated on groundhandling...

After having enjoyed the sun for a while I was (again) lucky to catch a ride back to my car...

Saturday: short 'excursion' to Arosa: by car to Chur and then by train. Suprisingly nice thermals at Weisshorn :-))

(Webcam)

above Weisshorn (at 2950m)

Chur (Werner)

Chur: historic city

Thanks to PeterW for helping on launch and WernerG for the ride back to my car!

Sunday: too much Föhn in the fcst :-(  That's also the reason why I didn't take my car to Arosa and stay there overnight.

Arosa

Saturday: 2 flights

1.flight: surprisingly there has been even some slight thermal activity at 1100 :-)

the webcam took by chance a picture of my take-off

artificial lake: the water is used for artificial snow for preparing the slopes

2.flight: I had hoped that the conditions would improve more; thermals had been a bit stronger than on the first flight, but remained just a little too weak.

While packing up I pulled out unintentionally my rescue - I hope I put it back in correctly! I'll have it checked next week...

Dinner at 'Lamm&Leu'; once more the meat has been absolutely outstanding!

Sunday: unfortunately not as nice as yesterday...

... the high altitude clouds blocked the sun almost completely; so just a sledder to Chur (with some reduced sink at times).

Alp Scheidegg

 2.11. and more than an hour of flying :-))

My original idea has been to go to Alp Scheidegg for some groundhandling; I didn't expect such nice conditions at all. After toplanding I did a little groundhandling and than just a sledder to the LZ.

 

The rest of the week doesn't look very promising; hopefully the conditions will be ok for the weekend, so I can try some flights in Arosa...

Cavallaria

In the morning conditions didn't look very good at first, but after 1000 the sun started to burn away the high clouds :-) I met PierAndrea at Lessolo (LZ for Cavallaria) and we took the 1100 shuttle to the top launch.

Lessolo: (top) launch is just above the wind sock; on the right side: Andrate.

Top launch

Contrary to the wx fcst, the wind at launch (and for the whole day!) was much stronger than predicted.

 

Top launch (PierAndrea)

PierAndrea (as usual) was quick to get airborne. I think I could have handled the conditions by launching into a lull, but like some others I decided to hike 20' down to a lower launch, where the wind had (mostly) a good speed for launching. Later only some hangliders launched from the top, everybody else from here...

Decollo 'manifestazione'

Decollo 'manifestazione'

Nice, strong thermals made climbing up easy, but also in the air the influence of the S/ SW-wind could be clearly felt and today I was not really in the mood to be 'shaken' around too much ;-)

Cima Cavallaria; LZ (left of roundabout)

Landing after slightly more than an hour.

LZ Lessolo

Belice (Santa Elisabetta)

Today I woke up to a cloudless sky. At 1100 I met PierAndrea at Salto and we drove up to the Belice launch which offered  a great panorma: Mt.Viso, Torino (below the haze), ...

As soon there was a chance to stay up, PierAndrea launched; I waited another 30 minutes, hoping for some better established thermals.

By chance I launched into a good cycle, which brought me about 400m above take-off.

Gran Paradiso (4061m)

Nice thermals and great views! I never got really above 1600m and flew for about 1.5hrs, then my fingers slowly got cold... Contrary to PierAndrea who flew for more than 4hrs and could climb to 2300m - but what else would you expect from a pilot with probably more than 25'000hrs (HG and PG) - many of them around here. That's more than 10 times more artime than I have on PGs and about twice what I have if I add all my flying hours...

Andrate (San Giacomo)

As the weather on the North side of the Alps over the weekend was changing rapidly towards 'winter', I decided at short notice to travel South (Piemonte -Italy) as conditions there looked flyable (at least until Tuesday) with temperatures up to 20°C. So I left home on Saturday afternoon and drove via San Bernardino to Ivrea; I preferred to travel that way as in front of the Gotthard tunnel queues of up to 6km were reported on the radio :-(

Today at 1000 I met my friend Ennio at the LZ for Andrate (San Germano). He was going to do 2 tandem flights on his hangglider and I offered to drive his car down after his first take-off (at 1145).

Andrate

 

'San Giacomo'-launch

The day looked rather promising, but at the time of Ennio's first flight thermals had been not strong enough yet.

Unfortunately, his second passenger arrived only at 1330, so I was ready to launch finally by 1430. Meanwhile the weather had changed quite a bit...

looking SE along the Serra towards Lake Viverone

at the same time: looking North into the Aosta Valley

LZ San Germano

 

Nice strong thermals (up to 5m/s) quickly got me to cloudbase. But then the clouds (over)develloped rather quickly and it even started to rain a little :-(  Therefore I cut my flight short. While packing up there could even some thunder be heard. (When driving back to my B&B it was raining rather heavily.)

Obviously (with hind sight!) I shouldn't have offered to drive Ennio's car but should have waited on launch till about 1300 as then I would (most probably) have had a decent flight in good conditions...

As Ennio is unable to join me for the next wo days, he put me in contact with PierAndrea Patrucco (the local 'crack' - he flies up to 600hrs/year mostly in this reagion), who agreed to 'take care' of me on Monday and Tuesday ;-)