May 20th-29th,
2012
As is typical with hanging out at
a paragliding place, the days become “Groundhog Days”, with a routine that
generally repeats every 24 hours. In Bir
at this time of the year it is imperative to wake up early (7am-ish), assess
the weather and be ready to head up the mountain by 8:30. Most flying occurs from mid morning to mid
afternoon. After landing a late lunch
ensues with your fellow fliers in order to discuss the action in the air.
A number of days I would head up to launch with Matthew,
Thomas and Ron (or some combination thereof) but lo and behold, who returned to
the hotel: the Spaniards! This time it
wasn’t just Miquel and Tolo but also their friend Oscar whom they met up with
in Shimla, some 50 kilometres east of Bir.
Their plans to vol bivouac to close to the Nepalese border had been
thwarted by strong wind and dodgy landing options along the way. It was a pleasant surprise to see them again.
On one flight I had a bit of a scare. I had flown over to “Waldo’s Ridge” to check
out Tatopani, the hot springs I had visited with Matthew and Thomas, from the
air and when I returned over the peak behind launch I began to head out to the
valley but I was slowed down to 6 km/hr and sometimes I was drifting to the
left. I also started to go up at a
constant 4-5 m/s. There was no cloud
directly above me but there was behind me and it must have been sucking me
up. I put on big ears (a paragliding
manoeuvre where the tips of the wing are folded over to increase sink) and that
caused all hell to break loose. I spun
to the right as part of the wing collapsed and it fell backwards. I went hands up (no brakes) to let it sort
itself out and weight shifted to the left.
I didn’t spin for long but then I was wildly pitching back and forth
with the wing coming almost straight in front of me. I applied the brakes as best as I could to
minimize the pitching but then the wing collapsed almost completely…hands up
again… I got it flying properly again
within 10 seconds (but long seconds indeed).
Now I need to get out of here. I
tried big ears again but found myself going up at 3-4 m/s. Okay, spiral dive time. My first spiral basically maintained my
height. The next 2 or 3 were more
aggressive and did get me down a few hundred meters and I gained some forward
speed towards the valley. Over the
valley I hit major sink and my vario’s sink alarm was music to my ears. It was constant for a number of minutes which
I didn’t mind at all. Coming in to land
I was perplexed by the flags at 3 different spots around the LZ which all
pointed in different directions so I trusted my GPS the most. Once safely on the ground…I kissed it! Tolo and Oscar were already there, Matthew
and Thomas came in soon after and then Miquel returned, having made it to
Dharamshala and back...well done boys!
It’s definitely time for lunch.
Me coming in for a landing:
With my landing gear out:
Just after kissing the ground...still buzzing!
Matthew landing:
Oscar at lunch:
Our evaluation of the never tried before "Meakins 10000" beer:
Later enjoying sunset with the Spaniards:
And a nice sunset it was...
On May 25th, we were up at launch again and today
for some reason I thought would be a big day.
As usual Thomas was the first one to launch and I went next, hoping to
maybe follow this wizard of the sky. My
goal was to make it to the next ridge after Waldo known as “Big Face”. It lives up to its name as it is an
intimidatingly large rock face. It was
fairly easy to work along the front of it and fly around the corner, following
the way that Thomas had flown. There I
hit a boomer of a thermal…10.2 m/s up for at least 3-4 seconds! I continued to gain height before attempting
the next valley crossing but then decided to follow a ridge up to the snowline
and the big mountains instead. Wow! My first time flying close to snow covered
mountains. At first I’d dismissed trying
to go much further towards Dharamsala but flying along the rock faces I was
able to maintain height and it wasn’t turbulent. I continued along, gobsmacked at the views
and I sure wished I had had my camera (which was in the shop getting
fixed). Some of the areas were pretty
gnarly and it looked like a long glide out to the safety of the main valley and
I wondered whose balls I’d put on that morning but I continued on. The mountains got bigger and bigger as did
the steepness of the chutes running down from them…but it all seemed okay
although slightly unnerving.
A couple of crappy quality pics I snapped with my cellphone (and not on the flight I just wrote about...but I had to give you some idea):
I got a bit worried that high cirrus cloud was covering the
sun and might shut down any thermals but hugging close to the mountains I
remained at 4100 meters ASL (above sea level) or higher. At 30 kilometers from Bir, I arrived at a
huge mountain and by this time my fingers, only protected by my thin gloves with
wool socks over them, felt like blocks of ice.
I decided it was more important to try and make it back to Bir than to
worry about going another 10 km to Dharamsala.
When I was 25 km away from Bir I saw Miquel fly by, about 1 km out from
the mountains where I was (sadly I later found out that he didn’t see me). When I was back near the launch area, I experienced
the roughest air of the flight. “Come on
already…I just want to go and land!” I
slowly flew out to the valley, had half a pee over the forest and then pulled
big ears and did a few spirals to come down.
What a flight! My longest time
wise at just over 4 hours and furthest out and return (60km) and also my
highest flight and probably strongest thermal…oh la la!!!
The Spaniards (from left to right): Oscar, Tolo, Miquel
Miquel had a problem with getting cold fingers and so he took my idea of putting socks over gloves to the next level...on a non-flyable day he cut and sewed his socks into proper gloves...the boy's got talent!
One of the many times I said goodbye to the Spaniards (with Naresh the hotel owner in the middle):
Within a week, I raised the bar with a 5 hour and 10 minute
flight to Dharamsala and back, about 83 kilometres in total. I flew a lower route this time, not playing
up in the snowline of the big mountains but that didn’t mean the flight wasn’t
full of excitement and challenges. Once
again I was chasing Thomas to Big Face and beyond while Matthew, the only other
solo pilot in the air, had a local flight as he was still recuperating from an
aborted launch from a week ago where he injured his back. Thomas and I were in regular radio
communication about the developing clouds which would push out from the
mountain range and then quickly retreat back.
At any time we were prepared to head out into the valley to land if it
looked as if a thunderstorm was imminent.
In-flight action:
Thomas and I met up at the 30km point from Bir, with him
having already made it to Dharamsala (so he had flown 20 more kilometres than
me at this point). I decided to press on
to see if I could also reach Dharamsala and make it back, which was one of my
goals on this trip. Thomas told me that
I only had 3 more ridges to go but each one of those required me to climb up,
glide to the next one and then repeat (like big stepping stones). Soon I saw the huge cricket stadium of
Dharamsala down in the valley along with the conglomeration of buildings and
homes of the city...I’m getting close!
Big Face:
Crisscrossing roads on the hillside:
As I pushed my way to a lower barren ridge, I recognized
that I was approaching McLeod Ganj, the home of the Dalai Lama, and a place I
had briefly visited three weeks prior. I
could pick out the large triangular awnings of the Dalai’s temple and tried, in
vain, to pick out the guesthouse where I had stayed. I have to admit that from the air McLeod Ganj
looked pretty ugly which initially surprised me but then again the prettiest
part of staying in McLeod was looking up at the mountains! While reaching this ridge I was hit by strong
sink and a stiff headwind. I was at only
2250 meters above sea level, lower than the launch I had left back in Bir some
40 kilometres away. It looked like it was
going to be a bit of a challenge to get back...but in fact, it wasn’t too
bad. The first 5-6 kilometres took a
while as I worked every piece of lift I could find and seemed to take forever
to fly above 3000 meters but then I hooked into a solid thermal and was up to
4100 meters and began to cruise back east to Bir. It took me three and a quarter hours to reach
Dharamsala but only two to return.
As I glided towards the landing zone with plenty of height,
I cracked open a chocolate bar, which by now was nicely chilled, sat back and
enjoyed the ride with a big grin on my face...
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