| Flygirl tries Hang Gliding (2005 Sep 19) |
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Just want to say thanks to Iannie for the intro into hang gliding on Saturday 17th Sep 2005. My legs hurt, my arms hurt and I don't know why my ribs under my breasts hurt? You hang gliders use some very strange muscles to get off the ground. It was fun and now I know why you guys feel you experience the closest to free flight. With paragliding I am pulling a drogue into the sky and being held back in flight. With hang gliding, I felt effortless glide..the 2 seconds my feet were off the ground. Really nice feel. Would like to experience more once I am comfortable back in the air again. I learned the grape vine to beer grip really fast. Necessity the mother of all inventions as they say. Took most of the morning for me to twig that when I felt I was losing control, slowing down was the wrong way to sort it out. Two nose dives and unlady-like bum in the airs made me realise the error of my ways. "Run Forest, RUN!" I will be coming back for more..just give me awhile to settle into flying again and having fun. Thanks Iannie From: "John Vamvadelis" (Ianni)Sent: Monday, September 19, 2005 11:24 AM Subject: RE: [cahgc] Re: [flycape] if you are near Atlantis this Saturday Hi Gaynor, list etc .. No problem. Well done on a very hard mornings excercise! Gaynor was the only other person on time, so she was the one to help rig my atlas, and listened patiently while I explained the design stability of HGs. There was very very little wind, in fact it was just lightly thermic. We started with picking up the glider and then some flat ground runs to cover take off runs and flaring to halt the the glider. Gaynor was incredibly attentive and quite determined. Then we did the same thing a few times with a knee hanger and helmet attached. The wind seemed to switch, so we relocated a couple of times, and at one time were running into quite a 'hole' in the dunes. I think I learned at least as much as Gaynor: remembering to explain a grip change, and how to crash, and a couple of other things. Airspeed => control. Gaynors energy seemed boundless and eventually I called a time out. For I was buggered. Soon Ravi appeared with 2 friends, both very interested. I repeated the procedure with each of them, and later with another oak "Mattie". The silly smiles that grow out of confused expressions of uncertainty made the morning worth while. The wind picked up and the runs were mainly fast walks. Gaynor not only had the toughest wind conditions, but did more runs that the other 3 oaks I helped combined. Well done Gaynor! Thanks for trying something different and with such a monumentus effort. I had been on the dunes since 09:30 and Ros eventually came to tell me to eat something. I got her to do a couple of runs, with the Atlas. Ros would have been much more comfortable with Lennoxs Picollo, but he was busy with that glider too. I was pretty buggered as I kept running the whole day as waves of fresh young folks arrived one after the other. I left just before 3pm,(after 5 hours) and was rather knackered from the sun and the fun. It was a perfect day for Signals and Craig M had a blissful flight at SLP. Some PGs went XC from Paarl rock and I have not seen so much thermic activity with such good cloudbase for a long time. My goal is to be fit enough to handle a 3-4 hour training session and then 3-4 hour flying session, but last Saturday afternoon saw me helplessly asleep, in bed. Later, I was taken out for drinks and clubbing, which probably helped the recovery. (at least of the legs). Much fun was had by everyone and things look good for some new pilots in CT soon. See you up there, Ianni |
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