Nobody around. Had a day off.

Don't know yet if any of the lcals went out for fun.

Clear sky this morning, but westwinds, too strong. This afternoon, angry sky. And we have our limits, flying our wings in angry skies is playing russian roulette.

Above a photo of our Polish pilot Cordian, flying his Sport3 Airwave at Toix this week.

If you want to read about the most stupid woman on earth who flies paragliding,
here it is :
http://www.thewest.com.au/default.aspx?MenuID=29&ContentID=21564
It was here second close call this year. Unfortunately a Chinese pilot who was found later, was found dead. Other ( belgian, dutch pilots etc... ) had to throw their reserves. Some radios were fried by lightning.
As you can read on several threads on different forums, the flying in those conditions were insane.
I am sorry, this is not making me sad, but angry. This has nothing to do with flying any more, it is about who has the biggest one. They lost it.

All day flying over the coastline.

Marcel finished his 6 week winterstop with hours of smooth air. His friends Piter and Frans would have loved it.

Two norwegians still around. One had better luck than the other, the old Edel Control didn't seem to do the job. I think I have never seen such a bad glider before. This one is made to float, not to fly I imagine.

Too warm for the time of the year, it was 30 degrees on the terrace. The air was nice and comfortable, not chilly at all, although it blew from northeast.

Although the wind was laminar, some pilots (still, after all these years ...) couldn't take off, and had to pack their gear. Better, because if you can't take off in a 15 km wind, you shouldn't soar it neither. So good thing, they went off and had a drink instead. Imagine the site got jeopardized again, by visiting pilots who refuse help from us locals, more experienced pilots, because they think they know it all... . These kind of people, aaaaaarrrrgghhh.........

Hoy hemos volado en Villena. Today we wanted to change sites and fly at La Solana, Villena. and we did. Marcel almost flew two hours.

4 Norwegians showed up, two of them out of the blue. We all flew nicely at La Solana.

I had to do a tandem with Clara who won a contest with a magazine.
Her winning price was flying with us doyouwanna tandem.
Take off was great, and her landing was fine.
Just when I got out of my harnass, my flying suit ripped apart. Jesus, half naked. just boxer short, very white legs, white socks, sneakers.

I mean I am not vain, but it is very embarrassing in the middle of the valley with a lady on the side, losing your clothing. I am never gonna buy another Paratech flying suit any more !

Got to go. My lady neighbour turned 80 today , so she invited us for tapas and wine. As she is 80 , or more, she starts repeating herself every other minute. To keep the conversation going, I usually drink too much of her local wine from the bodega. And since her elderly husband doesn't drink any more, the glasses get filled up quicker, wonder why.

I love the old lady though, abuela, bless her. Cheers.

Two norwegians nearby, in crime city Torrevieja they stay.

Very low airtime, no reason to take them to Calpe today.

So had a bit of a day off, riding the motorbike and all of a sudden watching a trike passing over.

Got closer to where it was gonna land, and surprise surprise it was Basil who was trying out his new trike.

He's gonna try to make some money flying tourists in his trike.

In the air !

Calpe, southwest. Frank our norwegian friend was cruising around to find us, but at last we met him. Meanwhile Marcel this his maiden flight over the cliffs of Calpe, overlooking Toix, one side Calpe other side Altea.

Some foto's can tell you how pretty it was, and how summery it was. Foto's by Jose Luis Segorb.

During today, I had to meet somebody who had a car for us to take to Africa. Yes, we will go to Africa this year in october, Morocco, Mauretania, Senegal, Banjul Gambia. We will fly as much as we can during our trip. Once arrived, the car will be sold for charity. We are organising this with a belgian organisation.
We will ask for sponsoring in due time. It'll be humble, like making publicity on our car with putting your sticker on it, lets say for 25 euros. Or sponsoring for charity, 1 cent per kilometer or something. Lets think about it. We will also bring toys, if possible drugs, good drugs I mean David ! along. Fly and drive !! Can't wait to fly in Morocco.

The car that is taking us is an old Mercedes from 1982, fingers crossed. See foto.

More details you can find on our webpage, just click on things.

Western winds again, keeping us grounded. Very strong winds, and unstable in the northern parts of Alicante.

A sunday, a spanish sunday. Families picknicking in the open, a picknick is always in the open no ? But again too much wind, from, you guessed it, the west.

We left early to check Toix, but too much west, too tricky.

Pascal and Maggie, two girlies left today. I was happily surprised by their greed to get in the air, and all the time being keen to go fly. Their skills are there, I could tell.
I do guide daily and this for over 7 years now. I get low-airtime pilots, to comp pilots coming down to fly or train for bigger stuff.
I was very quickly confident in taking the girls to the hills to do some thermalling.

Once a decision was made to turn into the thermals, I sensed no nervousness, I only saw smooth turns. And when I drove down I could only see happy faces after happy landings. Unfortunately your airtime wasn't doubled, due to the weather.

I hope to see you again, and fly together. See you later Pascal, Maggie, Dave and Ron.

A very warm day again, but way too windy.

As soon as it is dark, wind droppes, not a sigh.

Very windy today, up to 90 km per hour.

We went for sierra de Aguilas, visited the copper mine. There was nothing else to do, not even kitesurfing was possible, way too strong.

We enjoyed it, even with this wind we managed to find a windless spot to have a BBQ. It was a deep bed of a dry river. Bits later in the caves of the copper mine with torchlights.

Soon after up to Jijona to taste some 'turron', and a 'muscatel'.

We had to enjoy ourselves doing something else than flying, and I think we can't complain, we were out in fantastic scenery and had a good time. Sheltered from the wind it was warm, in the wind, the cold northwestern wind cut into your cheeks, brrrr. I think my blood got thinner, that's why we had several 'orujas' to warm up.

Maggie, Pascal,Dave and Ron looking for gold near the copper mine as foto, cheer up, soon we tell you about our thermals again.

The Bracknell isobarmap shows that all over the western parts of Europe it is shitty weather.

In Spain unfortunately this time as well. South of Alicante down to Almeria, they had howling winds, up northwest they expect windgusts of 120 km/h.
We didn't have any wind, but slight miserable rain all day. Luckily those days are very rare. Tomorrow we are looking at a non flyable day, becasue of the wind. But sunshine and 20 degrees at midday.

We plan to visit Sierra de Aguilas, and climb down in the old abandoned coppermine. No flying, we have to enjoy the weather and the surroundings this way.

Felt like spirng today. Looked like spring today.

20 degrees, warm, beach weather. But not flying weather.

Too much west wind, and west is the pest down in Alicante for flying. Give us anything else and we fly.

Chuffed to bits !

That's how our british pilots felt after this day.
We left early, told them to be sportive about the day. Maybe it was gonna be too strong, after all west wind was forecasted. And that's no the wind we want !

Passing Peña Rubia, it looked, shit coffee I guess, lots of wind.
But lets check La Zafra, where we were supposed to meet Jose Luis (thanks for the foto's !).
All of a sudden blue sky, not the mist, fog, the clouds we had from coast to Peña Rubia.
At take off, almost no wind, but right on the hill. So parawaiting - I hate parawaiting.

Girlies first for top to bottom. They are real low airtimers, so it was good for them to check the air, have a no stress take off, no stress flight and a lovely landing.
Bits later winds picked up and hoorah !
Look at the pictures, the sky was great, the thermals were present.

I told a week ago, we were gonna be back at this never visited site, La Zafra. Well we did and how. It was a superb day.

We're all chuffed to bits !

Lots of pilots around. A group from Cantabria, family of the famous spanish pilot Borja Rodriguez. One lost pilot from Madrid, and Basil with his students. By the way he teaches in English, so if you Brits want to learn the sport in a better climate, we can make you an offer.

By the time we left, more coming up the hill.

I think all felt a bit lonely, because it was obviously not the best day to call in sick.

At the coast the sun burned through the clouds, but inland it didn't.

Special mention for Maggie, who was brave, keen, strong, very committed today. She ran her ass off, alpine launching her Ozone Buzz.

Thanks Alex for giving us that update on the wind. Just when we got at the site winds were perfect. And it stayed that way till dark, two hours window.

A couple of hours soaring, just what my guys needed to get all ready for big flying tomorrow.

Lets think big, we should have thermalling weather and that's just what my rusty pilots need. Winter thermals in Alicante.

Sup'air Altix Medium, that's the harnass which I have on offer. It is brandnew, not even taken out of its box yet. Some pilot let me down, never transferred the money so I want to get rid of it.
Price is normally 490 euros all in, I sell it for 440 euros all in.
If somebody is interested please let me know ok ?
More details on sup'air page :
http://supair.com/fr/index.sellette.php?id=33

Today we were grounded, too much air from the east. And cloudy.

Friday today. Cliffs of santa pola where the site this morning.

Strong in the afternoon so we had to be early at take off.

Windlines on the sea, nasty clouds above it. Some of us flew, being ready to use maneuvers to get down in case.

On the photo some Med colours.

Ex Belgian air force colonel Marcel, jumped up the tree after seeing
a scorpion at take off.
Left of him Sonja, his girlfriend, taking photo's of the 'beast'.

Today was one of our better winter thermalling days in february !

It was Ian's first thermalling flight (over an hour), and Noel's best thermalling flight ever (over an hour), Leonard our kiwi, flew his brandnew Nova RA, Ogi sky high in the valley under his Airwave Sport3, and good old Henrik from Sweden, as always topping up his "Alicante-airtime". He's been here more than 10 times already, and still loves it (me).

After flying for over an hour in thermals, some development was coming in from the east. All of a sudden it got pretty gusty. Looking around it looked as if overdevelopment like yesterday was possible. But luckily it all died off, and we could do some flying in more dynamic conditions, till winds died off completely.

It's full moon, and tomorrow we get eastern winds. This could mean night flights at the clifs, overflying the lighthouse, watching the full moon as a spot on the mediterranean sea.
But then it has to be perfect, wait and see.