Full speed

Here's a nice screenshot from some video footage of a windy day at Zoutelande. Going full speed over the dunes :-)

Hang gliding couldn't be easier!

We tried winching the Condor for the first time on saturday. Well, hang gliding couldn't be easier ;-) Ideal glider for training purposes!

Nice flying weekend

Just had a very nice flying weekend with winch towing on saturday and dune soaring today, sunday. I shot a few video clips on saturday and quickly cut them into the next video. The video shows some starts and landings of students of hang gliding school Trike Valley.

Although it is still very early in the year (february), it was a nice day and I had an 8 minute flight from tow to 200 m thanks to some light thermals. I had about the same situation just a week ago, where I had an unexpected 15 minute flight from a tow to 400 m. It was unexpected then, because the area was almost overcast, but apparently, the air was very unstable. Good to get going again :-)

Here's the video:

Today was overcast but SW winds were predicted and they provided an opportunity to go soaring at Zoutelande in Holland. The winds were pretty strong when we arrived there and were even a little stronger when the gliders were set up. I had an enjoyable flight with some fast and low ridge racing. Going 90 km/h, sometimes just 10 feet above the ridge is quite impressive :-)

Hang Gliding 2008 video

Ruben and I spent a few evenings running through last year's video material and are proud to present you the following video:

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:

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:

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...