Back to groundhog days... The daily routine was wake up before nine, get ready and meet the Parataxi at 9:50, up the mountain by 11, parawait, paraglide, have a beer or two at Teja Bar (pronounced “tay-ya”), cook some dinner back at camp, do a little blogging and/or emailing and go to bed. Can’t complain with the routine.
On Sunday morning I was ready at the usual time for the Parataxi. The other driver for Wolfgang should up first and said it would be tight as to whether they would have spot for me. As we waited for Wolfgang, he pointed out a helicopter that was high up on one of the nearby mountain ridges. He told me that a few days earlier when they had a bad thunderstorm that a lightning strike made instant roasted mutton out of 100 or so sheep! Imagine seeing that happen...and the lovely smell ;) So they were in the process of removing the carcasses...expensive way to do it!
Up on launch, I took off early, concerned that it was going to overdevelop early as the clouds were gathering around the vicinity. I was the first one working my way along the 7-8 kilometer ridge of the Stol which made me wonder what the others knew that I didn’t...it seemed to be working okay, what were they waiting for? A few wings caught up to me and I then crossed to this knoll that can be a hopping point for heading further east to the town of Tolmin, another 10 km away. It wasn’t working for me, and others today and I scratched long enough (no I didn’t have an itch, it’s a flying term for staying as long possible on a ridge hoping, praying to find some lift) that I didn’t make the regular landing zone by Teja Bar. I landed in a field where I saw another PGer land and noticed a gravel parking lot with lots of vehicles for white water rafters so I figured it must be somewhat friendly to extreme sports. I was actually probably equidistant from the regular LZ back to the campground, just on the other side of the river. I returned to camp and then decided to hike up to some nearby waterfalls call Slap Kocjak that Garth and Holly recommended. They were quite lovely although they were tucked around a corner that you could reach on a wooden platform but due to the mist, there was nowhere to sit and really soak them in...without getting literally soaked.
Nearing the waterfalls:
The falls:
The river:
On Monday I decided to be more patient on launch and “parawaited” for an hour and a half and was one of the last ones to huck off...but it didn’t help much. I flew for just over an hour, which back on Vancouver Island I’d be ecstatic about, but I pretty much followed the same route as the day before and got flushed out in the same spot, this time however I made sure I had enough height glide to the proper landing zone.
Tuesday, I increased my patience even more, waiting until 2:45pm to launch and again was one of the last to go. It didn’t seem like I was waiting for too long as our van broke down on the way up (overheated but then the latch to the hood release was also broken (related to Betty?!?). I have also gotten into the habit of bringing up a book to read while sitting up on launch. It was a more exciting flight today with some cloud action (not right in them but in some wisps and also being beside them). Oh well...try again tomorrow. I hung out at Teja’s Bar for a few hours and met a few locals. Teja is actually the nickname of the owner, whose real name is Mateka (I don’t think I got the spelling right...sorry Teja) and she works very hard and is super friendly. Roman was a 68 year old retired guy who just took up paragliding last year, hat’s off to you sir! There was Simon (pronounced “See-mon” here) who was a former tax collector and a good friend of Teja’s and the last guy, Eric, was an interesting guy to talk to about local politics and the general state of Slovenia. Really starting to feel at home here...
Playing in some cloud:
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