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@ 3000' | Rate /1000' | Base | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Coaches Corner for February 7/2012 - Hoping for Torrey flights today at the Ozone Dealer Meeting. | We sell and dispense ADRENALINE here at FlyBC. The best "over-the-counter cure" for weekday/workday boredom. Click here to find out why FlyBC is your "best and only" choice for paraglider/paramotor training. . At FlyBC all our Instructors are Certified Professionals, trained and registered with the HPAC and USHPA, unlike other schools who rely on untrained pilots to do student guiding. We offer the best & safest training value in BC! Put your TRUST in FlyBC. We are authorized dealers for Ozone, SkyCountry, Gin, Nova, Paratoys Paramotors, Advance, APCO, Wills Wing and many other Brands. SkyCountry SCirroco 18 Speed Wing, Nova Factor 21 & 23, Swift Small, Addict II XS are here for a few days for test flights.
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San Diego Report - I hopped on a Volaris flight at 7 am direct to San Diego this morning to attend the Ozone Dealer Meeting. Quite a bit faster than driving here, but I needed to be here and back in Jocotopec in a few days. | I did a few errands here before heading to Torrey Pines to meet up with the guys, and watch matt & Mike fly their speed wings down to a beach landing in no wind, cause they were bored with no wind here. It was sunny but cold compared to Guadalajara weather. We finally gave up and headed to dinner at a La Jolla Brew Pub. Sumas Report - Derek said they could not work on Sumas today, strong north winds by the main gate. Looks like more wind this week and rain at the end of the week. Colombia Report - Yeah, Colombia is cool, been a bit cloudy so real light in the mornings. 240m vert at 6:1 glide to LZ, so NO scratching. There is 1-4 hours of ridge lift here every afternoon, nice big top landing site. One flight this morning, 2 to top landing and 1 to LZ this afternoon. Launch is much like Coopers, except wider and completely covered in nicely mowed grass. It gets real strong from 12-1 to 3-4 midday, so everyone breaks, except the tandems, who launch with assistants. Pretty sweet schedule. Launch is 100m from my bedroom. Room rate ($30CAD for private room) includes breakfast and retrieves. Flying Niviuk Hook 1 (DHV 1-2) with a harness that is nice once in it, but does have the punching midget for a minute or two every flight - Eric G.
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Mexican Adventures - I dropped Sean off for his noon flight to Toronto and continued into Guadalajara for errands as it looked a bit lame. | I went to the Outlet Mall on the south road home and got the Suzuki washed and rubbing compounded and waxed for 200 pesos while I shopped and removed all the scratches for San Marcos & El Chante. It OD'ed later and rained as I watched no one takeoff at San Marcos, I guess they were waiting for better cycles. My first non-working day since Dec 3rd. What a great run this winter! Click here for more pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures today in the new February Album. Click here for pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures for January 2012. Elk Report - Steve, Larry, Ivan, Eddy and a few others flew Elk early, while Kevin waited til later and he & Judy had a mini-XC to his HS field. Nice!!
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El Chante/San Marcos Report - we had breakfast in Joco Centro, as I was getting my stereo mount repaired as it broke from too much offroading. The stereo shop didn't have a replacement mount so a combination of Crazy Glue & baking soda was used to repair it. After 30 minutes of repair I was back on the road for 50 pesos. Mexican Ingenuity triumphs again. | We headed to Tapalpa at 10 am, even paying the Cuota on the Cuota Highway and when we passed San Marcos it was already west winds. I called Granger who was at Tapalpa and he said he was heading to San Marcos at 11 am. We exited the Highway at KM14 and drove to Pedro's LZ at San Marcos to check the winds. It looked tail to south on launch so we headed to El Chante Launch to fly and kill time. Granger followed us up to El Chante grumbling about geting stuck but he made it to Launch. Nice cycles and Camilo & Sean flew off with Camilo landing at the condo to get his car, and Sean landing at his favourite football field. Grangers two most experienced guys flew down to land with Sean. Not much lift, even the birds were just maintaining above the Cross. But solid launches and landings. Then off to San Marcos after lunch at Ruben's Restaurant, where we picked up Eduardo (Ruben's son) & Edith (Ruben's waitress) as they wanted to go flying too.Camilo was now back to fly again. I launched with Edith between gusts to find little usable lift even in the sunny spots to the North, bit we had an enjoyable 15-20 minutes of flight. Sean launched after me and got above launch but was uncomfortable as he was going up at 4 m/s, and down at -4 m/s all at the same time near launch. Very punchy so he headed out to Pedro's as Camilo drove down. Edith was very happy and excited about her flight! Granger showed up and launched his three guys and they were getting nice cloud suck to the south of launch, getting to approximately 500 meters over launch. As Camilo showed up they were still soaring so it looked promising for us again. But as we got to launch, local pilot Rueben was launching and going up . . . in the rain. He was soon B-stalling and Big-Ear'ing to the south airstrips as we waited for the small rain cell to pass. I clipped in Eduardo (a solid 100 kgs), and waited through some gusts again to launch. We had a good wing overhead and instead of running forward, Eduardo tripped and dove off the launch ramp sideways to the north taking me with him. We swooped through the bushes and trees as I got the glider flying fast to swoop over the trees to the north, very exciting for the folks on launch! We found no lift and strong North winds aloft as a cell to the south must have been sucking all the surrounding air. We had many passes below launch looking for lift and finally bailed out to the LZ for an equally exciting landing as Eduardo bailed again instead of running, another swan dive made the landing less than graceful. He was very scared but didn't mention it. He was happy he flew though. Sean launched after me and again got above launch, to get parked in the North wind. At one time we saw him going backwards and the further north he got, the more turbulence he got. after some prolonged wobbling he flew south and got too far away from the LZ causing him to crab all the way out but he never got upwind so he had to land in the new hangar area to the south as it got stronger on the ground. Safe landing for his last flight of his Tour week. A few other local Paragliders launched and headed straight to the south airstrip. It was quite clouded over from big over-development so no lift for the last pilots. Again we didn't get home til 6:30 pm but it is still light here til 7:00 pm now, and we headed to La Vita Bella for one last meal there for Sean meeting up with Jorge after dinner for a hotel tour. All my tour guests are now gone til Feb 12th, so I have booked some rest days with Colleen in San Diego before coming back to finish the Mexican Tours. Click here for more pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures today in the new February Album. Click here for pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures for January 2012. SuperFinal Report from Valle de Bravo - The official results are in and posted here . The last Task was run with a 76 km run to goal at the Lake and Nicole made goal. Click here for more pictures from Nicole's Picasa Album. More details at Nicole's Blog. More details at Brett's Blog. Woodside BC Report - reports came in live from Derek about 12 minutes of airtime at Woodside with Lee, Martin N, Martina in leeside conditions. Some Americans flew Cheam too via Helicopter according to Facebook.
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FlyBC Mexican Adventure Report - after another great Gloria's Breakfast we headed out for El Chante flights early on arriving about 1130 am. Nice southerly cycles despite west wind forecasts around noon for the area. | Sean was joined by Eric A & Don who were still tired from last night's night flight adventure til 1 am. They stayed in Joco town as they are heading to Valle tomorrow. Peter B is back from Sweden and he & Jorge brought up Ivan for a tandem, Peter's first flight here in 18 months. Unfortunately it was an extended sledder landing at our condo, with a few scratchy thermals due to the inversion. Jorge did a flight into the El Chante Malecon ignoring the lift as he claimed a hangover had taken over this morning. It was Sean's turn to tackle the mountain after yesterday's 50% collapse and he was nervous, but he had a nice launch and a few turns out front with the bird before heading out to the Football Field in El Chante. It was Eric's turn and he had "taken the bait" to try a top landing as he heard about Wouter's 35 attempts one day in December before getting in. He made about 5 passes and nailed it on launch, and then proceeded to fly again and slalom thru the trees behind launch for fun. Don was too tired to fly and we drove down together to retrieve everyone. And then on to San Marcos leaving Eric's car at Casa de Marina Hotel. San Marcos was just turning on when we arrived at 3 pm. Some tailwinds as we got there but it started cycling up strong in a few minutes. Some locals arrived with Valdo driving them, and David and the Canuck HG team arrived too dragging along Pedro K & Mille, so pretty busy for a Friday. Don & Eric launched and were soon at 'base at 3500 meters under the CUs. The locals launched and did a few turns on their parapentes, but were soon in Pedro's LZ. Sean chose to wait til 4:30 pm, and he launched after David on the HG and Mille also on HG. He was maintaining but not getting high and I left after 30 minutes to retrieve him as he was sinking, when he called to say he was 550 meters over launch and he was going to fly over the back. Reports from Don & Eric were that they were over El Chante launch at 3500 meters heading east. The adventure begins again. I found Sean right away in a field near the Pond, where a cowboy on a donkey stopped to talk to him about where he launched from . . . and the cowboy knew San Marcos launch. Eric flew back to the Joco Malecon to be near his car, and Don landed at the Chapalpa Ultralight Strip and walked 4 blocks to the bus stop but apparently the Red Buses were slow tonight as it took him 2 hours to get home with a dead cell phone so we couldn't reach him. It was now 8 pm and they have to drive to Valle tonight so it will be 2 am before they arrive there for sure. We had dinner at La Vita Bella one more time and met some Vancouverites who have retired to Ajijic who were sitting next to us, small world. Click here for more pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures today in the new February Album. Click here for pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures for January 2012. SuperFinal Report from Valle de Bravo - The official results are in and posted here . Task was run. Click here for more pictures from Nicole's Picasa Album. More details at Nicole's Blog. More details at Brett's Blog.
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Mexican Adventure Report - we had breakfast at Gloria's today with Gary for the last time on this trip, as he is headed to New Zealand for 4 weeks. We decided on El Chante flights early on as I saw vultures circling over launch there from the condo. | We arrived on launch to nice SE cycles and an inversion layer, but the birds were thermalling in the gulleys and out front. Sean launched after sometime around 1145 am, and headed west to the cross gulley but got rotored and didn't manage a surge and he had a 50% collapse and fell into it and disappeared behind the ridge as I yelled "opposite brake and opposite weight shift". He heard me and did just that and the glider recovered nicely. He had enough of that thermal and headed straight out to the Lake and the new football field LZ pioneered by Gary earlier this week. By the time I drove down to get him he was 50 meters from the Hotel, where I picked him up. We drove to San Marcos and Pedro's LZ and met up with David and the HG gang from Ontario and told them about El Chante. The winds looked South on launch and we waited for a bit, before deciding to drive up and check conditions for the others so they didn't waste a trip in to launch. We arrived at 4 pm to perfect cycles and beautiful CUs all the way from Tapalpa to San Marcos, a perfect XC day. Sean launched and was soon "beamed up" to 3000 meters between two nice CUs. It was a bit lumpy for his no brake style of thermalling, so some coaching got him to min sink and smoother flight. as he topped out, I saw Don arrive from Tapalpa low just at launch height, but he soon climbed out too. Sean had enough thermalling by 45 minutes and was headng out to land as the HGers arrived, followed by Eric in his Honda chasing Don. I drove down to get Sean as Erc got ready to launch. Sean was packed up when I arrived and we headed back up for one more flight and some refreshments on the way. As we arrived I saw 2 HGs in the air, and the student Falcon was lying crumpled below the ramp. David was trying to extricate the wreck so I went down to help. The student was okay, just a few cuts but the glider sustained fatal damages: broken leading edge, keel, ripped sail, battens bent or broked. After removing the battens and folding the glider up, we dragged it back up to the flats, through all the trees and deadfall, not an easy task. Sean launched after the drama of removing the wreck and climbed out again to the north point, before heading over the back to land at 6 pm near the highway. Don and Eric were still in the air determined to have a night flight as the moon is pretty full reporting 4100 meter cloudbase. No idea how they were going to get their car afterwards as we were leaving for dinner. We headed east thru Jocotopec town, and on the east side we hit hard rain as the clouds OD'ed by the Lake. No thunderstorms but pretty close to the kind of instability that can cause one. We bumped into Peter as he arrived from Sweden last night and he is glad to be back where it is warm and sunny. Big family dinner for them, as it was just Sean & I for dinner. After dinner, as I got home I got a text from Don at 10:30 pm that they had just landed at Pedro's! I guess it didn't rain on them near the San Marcos Laguna. Click here for more pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures today in the new February Album. Click here for pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures for January 2012. SuperFinal Report from Valle de Bravo - The official results are in and posted here . Task was run, rough air with 2 more reserve tosses. Nicole texted me that she was in a remote LZ partway to goal after hard flying. Click here for more pictures from Nicole's Picasa Album. More details at Nicole's Blog. More details at Brett's Blog.
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Tapalpa Report - Sean and I arrived at Tapalpa Launch at 1130 am and heard that the Granger Group had already had a sled ride. | Sean was not interested in a sled ride, but when he saw Don launch and start climbing he was launching right after him, and they didn't come down for a long time. The Granger Group came and flew but only one guy stayed up as they all descended into the Piano LZ or scattered around that area. Sean was flying very well and was often "top of the stack" as the gaggle moved west over Launch to about 2700 meters. Eric A tried flying north but only found sink, but managed a low save 5 gulleys south to get him back to launch and the first top landing. Sean was 1:35 into his flight when he top landed at the back field and we headed towards San Marcos for the evening flight. On the way we saw virga near the Cross, but nice CU over San Marcos. We arrived on San Marcos Launch to tailwinds again despite the NOAA forecast of 15 kph west. David from Gravity was there with Terry from TO and a student but they were denied a flight too. We drove down to Jocotopec to unload the gear and headed to dinner at La Vita Bella for Gary's last night here before a 4 week flying trip to New Zealand. Click here for more pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures today in the new February Album. Click here for pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures during January 2012. SuperFinal Report from Valle de Bravo - The official results are in and posted here . Task 8 was called off as there was no lift. valle Task 7 cancelled from broers philippe on Vimeo. Click here for more pictures from Nicole's Picasa Album. More details at Nicole's Blog. More details at Brett's Blog.
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Tapalpa Report (plus some other sites) - we drove to Tapalpa after a Gloria's Breakfast in El Chante. | This time Granger beat us up to launch and his guys had a sledder and we only saw one wing in the air. When we picked up Sean in the LZ we saw some kiting action but no one launching, so we bailed and headed to Mazamitla. Mazamitla has yet to yield a flight this Tour as it has been North, too Strong South, and again North today. But it is a beautiful drive thru Pine Forests and a picturesque town, but we are here to fly so we headded to San Marcos. On the way out of town we hit a tropical rainstorm for a few kms, good thing we are leaving. We dropped off Gary at the hotel as he apparently ate too much at La Vita Bella last night and needed a nap, and headed to San Marcos. Light tailwind at launch, but it started to come in so Sean laid out his wing and got clipped in but before he could launch it started to spit. There was 0% POP in the forecast but Mother Nature had other ideas. We bunched Sean's gear into the Suzuki and headed down the mountain, glad he wasn't packing his wing in a rainstorm. The rain actually packed the San Marcos road nicely, as we were worried it might start running down the road as there are no cross ditches. We took Sean's gear to the condo to pack it properly under the Palapa roof, and as we were doing that, a large thunderstorm started with lightning and thunder. Hopefully this is the last of the rain we see on this trip. Click here for more pictures from the FlyBC Mexican Adventures today. SuperFinal Report from Valle de Bravo - The official results are in and posted here . It rained hard last night in Valle too, and a task was run and despite epic clouds and some OD'ing there was not much lift and no one made goal. valle task 6 the flight from broers philippe on Vimeo. Click here for more pictures from Nicole's Picasa Album. More details at Nicole's Blog. More details at Brett's Blog. Click here to find out who kicked butt in Mexico today!
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