Shitty weather to fly. Luckily a hard sun in between,but way too windy again. Sea nerveus and lots of angry clouds above us. Rainy at times.
Fingers crossed for our site San Antonio tomorrow.

Swedish young little star ALFRED !!!

son of Swedish pilot Fredrik Ahl

The most boring clouds from early morning, cirrus stratus. Whoever invented these clouds, I dont want to meet.

From afternoon onwards rain, till now late in the evening. And tomorrow more of this I fear.

Foto of the port of the village of Santa Pola.

Elisabeth, Alexandra, Amin, Michael and Bart, our Swiss friends arrived. Always nice to have your around guys. And thanks for the T-shirt, Kath looks lovely in it.

Morning flight at Peña Rubia, where winds were weak from north at first but soon veering to east. Arvid under his Nova Factor doing very well, same for all the others under their Sol, Edel (yes they are still around), Apco, and Nova Rookie gliders.

Thinking about the norwegian Magne and his Swedish friends who were here last week. They flew Peña rubia as well, with a babyXC achievement in for Magne. Hope all is well up north !

Later in the afternoon two windows flying at Cabo. Mid afternoon till it got too nasty, clouds and rainy. And early evening when everything turned out to be so smooth in the air, you could fall asleep or read a book flying.

Two foto's in one week. One last week, hammering sun. The other yesterday hail hammering down, destroying cactusses. A tremendous hailstorm hit us yesterday. In our village El Altet 10 cm of hail. Maybe not uncommon where you live, but mostly uncommon at ours.

I am writing this next morning, monday morning, as we didn't have electricity last night due to the storms. This morning cristal blue sky. We'll go out flying soon,

talk to you this evening.

Alicante rocks, written by Lucien Simon. Thanks for this Lucien.

Indeed Alicante rocks, yesterday at night, because during the day winds were too strong from the west.

Lots of allergy problems yesterday, the eucalyptus trees around my house are in blossom. Patio, nose and roof covered in tiny light yellow hairs from the tree.

Along the roads we pick figs, pommy granites, and soon the almonds will be ready.

Doug and Julie, hope you had some flying in already back home, nice to have guided you again, hope we'll fly together again.

Take care mister Niviuk !

If yo want to know what Doug and Julie achieved last week read his blog, and add it to your favouites :

http://dougieandjulie.blogspot.com/

Soutwesthj wind, smooth in the morning, strong in lae afternoon. Toix flyable. But not having the right pilots to go there.
I tried other sites but notpossible to fly.

Toix is tricky, again bullet proof take offs needed, and decision all along the flying is necessary. In between take off and landing there is the sea. If no laminar wind, it can be tricky for even experienced pilots, so I'd rather not took the risk.

We just had to enjoy scenery, as you can see on the foto, canyons near the city of turron (marsepan, nougat) Jijona.

Once back near the coast, blue skies, hammering sun.

Santa Pola soaring

Magne and Fredrik, soaring the coastline. Incroyable, increible, unbelievable with the winds that were forecasted. Southwest, and we flew for over an hour at our eastern site. While up high we could see the clouds moving southwestwards and not slowly.

At first I wanted to go inland, to Hondon, the only place I thought that would have a window early in the day.

But clouds were already suspicious enough not to drive all the way.

I told the guys to have a good day, and told them to keep their phones on in case I found a window somewhere. A call from Magne did it. He was at the coast and spotted a slight easterly wind.

A few lousy top to bottoms later, I could radio them to the lighthouse. Chris also arrived and got hisgood old Hook out, after two months being back down here from England, where he managed to do one top to bottom all summer.

Stevie and friends have gone home. Hope they get their flying in upcoming days, they said it was gonna be gooooooood out in Wales. Hope you all had a good time, lets meet again.

www.blauvent.com

don't miss it

Palomaret Alicante

Last days weren't the best days weatherwise. And the roads up our hills are damaged. No drainage, too much cost for the few days of rain we get a year, so mudslides here and there.

Maybe not a very respectfull way to use this Gin Sprint, because a very good dhv 1-2 glider. As it was in a yellow bag, easily to be spotted, we used it as target for our spotlanding comp.

And Stevie won it, together with Riis under his old Ozone Elektron.

Always fun, Cookie, Stevie and Riis, the way it should be. Our retrieval car.

And Julie around, taking shots at take off Palomaret, Doug flew his solo wing Niviuk Artik.

Norris waiting for launching, and Cookie in the air. If reading the sky, you can already tell that we didn't fly all day. But managed to fly thermals, very unexpected today. But hey, that's Alicante for you.

Swedish and Norwegian friends, Bernald, Magne, Fredrik. I hope you have a good time guys. Today was interesting building up confidence under a cloudy sky.

http://blauvent.blogspot.com/

Check out this blog. It is not a paragliding blog, but a very interesting blog from my best friend and pilot Carmen, who just opened her shop online.

Get to know her and her ideas, through her blog.
And then when interested check out her shop, http://www.blauvent.com/

You can call this publicity, but to me it is sharing something I do support.
As I think it is very creative, sideways linked to our sport, environmental friendly.

Check it out, I am sure there is something you'd love to give your partner or yourself... .

hugs and kisses,
Nick

Santa Pola soaring

Santa Pola soaring in a bit tricky weather. As you can see on the foto's, huge thunderstorms inland. But the coast was free, so some of us could have an hour of flying in.

We had the sea as indicator of the wind, and were looking behind our back all the time. For me no the most relaxing flight, as I do have lots of respect for clouds and weather. But, climb was smooth and well controlable.

Our swedish and norwegian friends were working hard on their groundhandling which can only be applauded ! Lets hope tomorrow morning we do have some window in the morning.

Alicante paragliding Peña Rubia

Chris, Doug, Julie, Cookie, Stevie and Norris after their flights at Peña Rubia. Where Magne (not on foto, still flying ..) registered 8 m per second thermals, and found cloudbase 600 meter above take off.

But soon it was time to get down to earth and chill as cumulus were towering around us.

Later in the day we had tremendous lightnings. Huge discharge cloud to the ground. Elecrical charge travelling from cloudbase (negative charged) to the ground (positively charged). Brilliant jagged bolts between sky and ground.
It is said that if your hair should begin to stand 'punky', it may mean that you are in the near distance of a positively charged area, risking to be hit by a strike. Auch. So cut your hair.

This afternoons' weather. So don't feel too bad.

Half hour later ...

Some shots taken by tandem passenger Julie.

Julie and Doug have made a sensational flight at Palomaret. The reached 2600 m ASL, which to my memory has never been achieved by any pilot before.

I am checking around, and nobody remembers having such a height at our favourite home site.

Skygods !

A 1600 meter climb for Doug and Julie on their tandem can't be ignored. Yes sir, 1600 m climb. Inland flying was epic.

For the whole group, unforgetable climbs. Veru unstable weather, flying on a southern site with northeasterly winds on top. So a hot valley and a cold sky, mastered by a spanish sun, the recipe for an unforgetable thermal-day.

Today other pilots had their XC done from Reconco. Others flew (like us later in the day) relaxed near the coast. Schools were teaching their students how.

Everybody filled up their boots.

Lots of activity today. Different schools, different sites. Good friends,no hassles.

Hunky dory !!

Late in the day, it got all overdeveloped, and cumulus nimbus were forming left and right, we even had to shelter for the storm at one point. And then we found out why raincoats have to be yellow for gods' sake.

After lets be honest, three days of 'sportive' flying, we were happy to stretch our legs, arms, wings at Santa Pola. Enjoying the soaring, untill it got too strong.

Excellent take offs, as you know very important for me. Flying is easy, the glider will sort out 99 procent of the probs. Landing is most of the time the easiest bit. But taking off is all in the hands of the pilot, not the glider, not the conditions, but the skills from the pilot.
Therefore I am happy to have our welsh friends who obviously have had loads of opportunities in Rhosilly to practice strong wind launches et... .

We'll all have fish with heads on tonight at a local fish family run restaurant in Santa Pola, with lots of wine 'vino tinot', from their home barrel. Weekend ain't it ?

Clouds over the sea, cumulus, towering inland. Some bad weather, instable weather coming up ? Lets hope our coastal sites will give us playtime.

Oh yes, we can confirm, one XC 130 km Dudo, 6 pilots more than 50 km yesterday on top of that.

Lots of pilots had the day of their life yesterday, well this couple had it as well.

Some soul in white bodies. Thanks Remi sending this to us, and we all hope your recovery goes well.

I don't remember my wedding being half so exciting.

http://www.20min.ch/ro/entertainment/videos_buzz/story/13661919

Bingo. The magic word was convergence today. And Ismael had his 50 km xc from Caudete into the province of Castilla La Mancha.

Plan was to join the local pilots of Monte Cabrer again to go XC, as well with the forecasted convergence south/east. But to me the winds were too south for Monte Cabrer so we moved to Reconco. Up there winds were too strong and Stevie found out it wasn't ideal for flying. Where could we go to profit from the convergence later on at 3 pm.

Caudete, lets call Ismael. Not strong here 'yet', he said. Hm.

Once there, indeed the windmills weren't making their nasty 'fvou-fvou-fvou' sounds yet.

But more a 'fvou - fvou - fvou' noise.

Ok, everybody quickly in the air, and get used to the air. After half hour things calmed down, no good cycles so most of the pilots down.

But Dougy and July on their tandem, Ismael and Norris still in the air and climbing.

Ismael took his chances and left northeastwards, going XC,please pick me up.

He made 50 km xc ending up in Castilla La Mancha.

Cloudbase at 26oo meter ASL, which is 1500 meter above take off.

Just a minute ago, I got notice that pilots as well in Monte Cabrer took their chances, with even more succes. Dudo made 140 km and ended up in Albacete I heard. More pilots went XC and had their personal bests.

What a day, putting Alicante mountains on the map as XC sites. Well well done, all of you - skygods.

Late afternoon there was still some coastal flying to end the day.