Still working on this article. It was a beautiful summers day with a light SE on Koringberg take off.  I had 'that feeling' that it was going to be a great flying day.  I was on my own, all my parabuddies working or at the All Africa Competition across the Flats.  I was planning to get in the air and fly down the flats valley between Piketburg and the Porterville ridge heading for Rhenosterhoek and the N7 Pass and go over to Grafwater or Clanwilliam - two of my Goals I would like to one day realise.  This felt like that kind of day - Epic.

With the Mostert Family away in Cape Town for the day I had no retrieve, so made sure I carried lots of water for my self-retrieve.  I phoned ATC Langebaan and cleared for flying in FAR45 and switched on the Overberg Paragliding Clubs portable airband radio monitoring 122.5.  At 11h42 I ran over the edge with The Shaolin.

My philosophy to 'get away' from Koringberg is to launch in the thermal I am going to take and go 'over the back' with.  I treat the launch as if it were a winch launch - I don't waste any lift - not even half a metre a second.  I seldom ridge soar waiting for the 'big one'.  If I am not successful with the thermal I launch into, I fly out in front, into wind and pick up the house thermal at its trigger point - broken eroded red earth cut into the fields at the base of the hill.  At this point the thermal is normally still building again so I have to be patient and work every breath and make no sudden movements that will spill my altitude and put me on the ground.

So this latter scenario is what happend.  I low saved, climbed about 300m ATO and went over the back of the hill and over the farm.  At the Mosterts Farm, I found another thermal and jumbed to the Koringberg to N7 thermal trigger and then onto the N7 thermal triggers.  By now I realised I was far too low and if I kept on like this it was only a matter of time before my 'luck' ran out and I would land and have to face a long hot walk back.  It had taken me an hour to fly 10kms, but yes, I had to slow down.

This was a good decision.  As I waited and worked every bit of lift - lots of  0.6ms with the odd 1ms etc thrown in, I heard 'Battaleur' call in saying he was routing through my area. I radioed my position and altitude over the airband and identified myself as a paraglider pilot.  However, shortly thereafter a black military aircraft passed at what I thought was about one kilometer from me - above and to the west, on a direct line from Piketberg over Koringberg.  I was a bit miffed at how 'close' he was and let him know about it, but 'Battaleur'  calmly replied something to the effect that he was at 2500ft (762m) and he had had me in visual.  From then on it was constant aircraft chatter, many of them at 1500ft (450m) and along the coast. I went into broadcast mode from time to time letting other aircraft know what my position was.

I crossed the Berg River and from this point on I climbed above 2000m for the first time and remained above this height for the next three hours whilst pushing into a light ENE wind.

i never did finish this article...:-(

Leonardo for stats.