54 Minute Paragliding Flight at Tekoa, Hoard The Hams, Fire, Grilling, Auroraless - Saturday

in Paragliding20 days ago

Best flight of my life yesterday! Hands down the most amazing day and I got my longest flight ever, by a LONG ways. My prior longest flight had been at Tekoa last year, a 15.5 minute flight.... Yesterday I quadrupled my time.

I got to the LZ at 10am where Aaron and Cosmo were waiting. Exactly at 10:30 we were heading up the hill in Aaron's rig.

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We got to the launch about 10 minutes later and it didn't take Aaron long to get setup an launch.

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Cosmo and I setup and it wasn't too long before I was launching and flying. I spent the next 54 minutes flying back and forth across the face of the hill.

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It was truly amazing to be in my first thermals and to be catching the lift without the intense fear I had felt before.

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I was able to see my flight instruments clearly with the front mount reserve so I was able to keep tabs on my time. I saw it hit 15 minutes, then 30 minutes, then 45 and I was trying so hard to make it past 60 minutes.

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In the end I sank out and flew down the hill to land near the LZ. Right near the end I was trying to stay in little bits of lift and got my wing doing wingovers accidentally less than a hundred feet over the ground which I had to stop quickly. Prior to this flight I had 4.5 hours of flight time... This added 54 minutes, nearly 1/4 of my flight time added on in one flight!!!

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After my flight I landed and then had to go drive to pickup Cosmo who had flown out to the Tekoa airport and tried to fly back to the hill but landed out a quarter mile from the airport. I picked him up then headed back to the hill. Mark was at the LZ so the 3 of us headed back up the hill where the Hang gliders were setting up for their flights.

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That is Mike's incredible hang glider. It has flaps, the tail with stabilizer, and is a serious swept wing that is shaped a lot different than the other gliders. Mike is the king of the mountain and knows every little trick in the book to get lift and stay in it. It was amazing watching him fly around and at points he specked out overhead.

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I was good for the day with my one flight. The winds were really gusty on top and then they would die. I was content watching everyone else launch and fly.

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I headed for home at 3pm and got home an hour later. After a while we ended up on the deck playing Hoard The Hams card game that the boys got from a Kickstarter.

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J got the fire going in the pit then after our game I grilled our burgers for dinner.

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We were out to soak for an hour then went in to watch a show for a bit.

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We went and hiked up the hillside to the valley overlook and I brought my Nikon with for some long shutter speed shots in hopes of seeing some aurora. We got jack shit.

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I did get this REALLY cool shot of hte moon. It was a crescent and only the SUPER bright part was visible to the eye but with a 30 second shutter I got the ENTIRE moon in the shot.

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Then I did the same for the highway and got this pretty cool shot.

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So it wasn't a waste of time in the end but we didn't see a spot of color in the sky.

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Today we will be going kayaking at Davis lake for Mother's day then this evening I will grill steaks in the fire pit.


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What a flight, if they get any longer you'll have to bring lunch up with you.
The pics are tremendous, talk about a bird's eye view.

What instrument gives you all of the details of your flight, an App on your phone?

I already make sure to have snack in my harness in case I do get up high. I have an app on my phone, my vario which tells me if I am going up or down, and then my Garmin watch I have built a paragliding activity for.

You went really high
If I were the one, I’d have been so scared

This experience is very special and beautiful and I will definitely have it one day in my life.

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That’s cool you got the long flight you’d been hoping for!