Monday, December 15, 2008

Some pictures from a sunny day in October

I just stumbled across some of the pictures while cleaning up the PC and I thought I'd put them online. They're from the 25th of October. We went winch towing that day. So here they are.

Preparing for launch ;-)


Waiting for the cable to be pulled tight:


Ready to go:


Take off on the first rope:


Steep ascent on the second rope:


Coming in for landing:


Monents before touchdown:

Sunday, December 14, 2008

Thermal flying in december!

Yesterday, Kurt and I left for a weekend in Neumagen. 3-4 Bft from the east was predicted, so that should have been fine. Arriving in Neumagen, we noticed that we were the only guys around and that there was almost no wind and it was completely overcast...

Sebastian and Mattias showed up and we got inside Sebastian's van, which has got heating. No panic, Neumagen is a place where the best flights usually are late in the afternoon. And it turned out to be the same this time around.

The winds picked up at 3 o'clock due to thermal acitivity and we could soar about 150 meters above the ridge. Now and then, we could also make 3 or 4 turns in 1 m/s thermals and gained another 150 meters. To make the flight complete, the sun came through, rewarding us with a spectular view on a white winter landscape in the distance.

Today was a lot less rewarding, although it looked promising in the morning. I had a 10 minute flight, gradually losing height. Kurt started a little later and had a nice 1,5 hour flight, be it in strong winds.

Below is a picture from this morning and a video of Kurt's take-off yesterday, still overcast as you can see:


Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Soaring @ Sunset

This video shows some moments from a truly beautiful evening flight at Zoutelande. The sunset was nice, the weather was nice, there were no other hang gliders around, the world was mine...

Saturday, November 29, 2008

Climbing a thermal

Want to know what it looks like to climb in a thermal? This one takes me from 1800 MSL to 2650 MSL. As you can see, a thermal is not the smoothest air to fly in, there are quite some turbulences. Watch how the lake (Lac de Castillon) comes into view as my height increases.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Nice flight at sunset

I had a real nice flight at sunset today. Nothing more than a little soaring and some ridge racing, but the view was spectacular. So I thought I'd share some pictures.





Monday, October 13, 2008

Spyder landing

A nice landing with a hang glider always is spectacular. Doesn't matter whether you're watching it or landing it yourself...


Sunday, September 21, 2008

Flying in Neumagen

Yesterday, I went to Neumagen. Pretty stable day but still had a nice flight. Here are a few images. First one is just after starting, above the Mosel river.



Flying about 500 meters above the start.


Climbing in a thermal together with Tom Haagdorens.


Although the air was very calm, it sometimes had a turbulent surprise ;-)