14 of december, almost the shortest day in the year. Daylight at its minimum and still 4 m/s thermals up to 900 meters above take off.

At first ambitions were high, we were all gonna take off and fly in group, getting high and trying to achieve some XC. My nose told me, today was special for flying. Ice-cold at take off, warmer in the valley and it was only 12 am when we arrived. So the sun still had to do its job properly. Clouds were forming, although we could see as well some lenticulares at first, ahum. But that could be the weather coming in from tomorrow onwards .... so lets be positive.

Took off to check but winds were too west to be good. Ok, lets wait.
Half hour later another try. Bad ,bad, bad, too much westwind as soon as you were somewhere out in the valley. We need a breeze but it was getting late.

( If we have westwind at Palomaret, we have to be careful, because there is a windchannel from the right (rincon bello) and this westwind could kick in nasty, especially low, near landings. )
Of course we could always fly the Palomaret-way and wait for the dynamic thermalling lift, but there was more in the air, my nose told me.

Should we wait, or move sites. More info coming in, northeast at the coast, west near Banyeres, damn strange. Luckily we were a little bit patient and took off after 2.30 pm.

Soon Jose Luis and Arvid were gone, leaving for Maigmo. Super, so maybe there still was something special going on today.

And there was. All of a sudden a steady but strong breeze was kicking in for over 6 minutes, gliders were dissapearing up to the forming cloud right above take off.

On the side, Arvid and Jose Luis were struggling to get some height near Maigmo.

That was the window. Later Urs (Swiss) told me, as soon as he left cloudbase at 1700 there was nothing big happening any more. Today was a matter of luck and skills. And we can only applaude for Urs, who was skygod today.

At 5 pm, Carla (dutch) and Arvid (Norwegian) landed in Agost. Luckily they made the best choice and landed before arriving in Agost. I mean soaring the church ... I don't know, the park in Agost is not so big to land in.

Damn good flying all of ya !!!! Good nose !