Day 3 Tour 1

Clear with "eminent cloudy" it seemed. 

This is 15 minutes later, here it comes!

After clear and strong conditions the day before, we experienced cloudiness today that turned out to be a great opportunity for both new and returning pilots. 

The guide rig was at full capacity and included a few clients as well. 

We stared at the clouds for a while as Flacko began to change his flat front tire from the drive up the rocky road to the take off spot today. 

Despite the shaded conditions, we readied our gear and were set to fly as soon as it started to look good. 

Xavier asked if I would film his launch so I got a photo of him as I said yes. Once the first pilot launched and soared upwards, it was a mad dash to launch everyone and I forgot to film him today.  Tomorrow perhaps!?

These 5 gliders above me are my group. I was so proud that we all gaggled so well together today.  Not long after this shot I went on glide for the next mountain peak and radioed for my team to follow when they finished circling and climbing as high as posiible. John was first to go on glide and followed me to the next ridge. As he slowed down and disengaged his speed bar, his glider pitched back, then forward, quickly diving off center which turned into a spiral dive. I didn't see this happen below me but he later said that he was losing altitude very quickly and opted to throw his reserve parachute. It was the correct choice and he landed safely without a scratch a few minutes later. He was very composed and relayed his situation to me with his radio. He assured me he was fine and would pack up and hike out. A friendly farmer arrived moments later and loaded John atop his horse and led the animal by a rope and he carried John's backpack for him as well. Wow. 

Clearly the air was getting stronger and two other pilots decided to land. The remaining two pilots and I went down range but it shaded there too and wasn't as good as we had hoped. Another pilot landed on the return trip back and finally Christian and I were the last two of my group still flying so we got as high as we could and made a glide to the flats.

I went first so he could watch for lift and choose a better direction if my line was no good. We each found a little lift but Christian landed near the bridge in the middle of he valley while I was able to get a good thermal just on the other side, gaining altitude and crossing to Zarzal from Roldanillo. 

Zarsal below me. I didn't get very far past the city as I started to sink when the sky shaded again. I circled back and landed at the edge of town. 

After landing I got a ride on a motorcycle with a nice guy who saw me land. We were in Roldanillo in no time. I paid him a few hundred Colombian pesos (COP) and we parted smiling at the others' generosity.  I walked across the town square or 'parque' as they call it here, to the bus station and caught the next bus to La Union with 5 ninutes to spare. It rained a little on the 15 minute ride back and the air smelled like hot pavement as the wet droplets flew in through the open bus windows. 

Once in La Unión, i walked a block to the town parque, grabbed a Tuk Tuk taxi and was at the hotel in minutes. John was there at the entrance retelling his story To otee pilotos and we gave each other a great big hug. He was still very excited and really wanted to fly again tomorrow.

We repacked his reserve parachute and he is good to go. Getting back on "the horse" is a good idea, and it was very much his wish. He said he was having such a great flight today, that he was disappointed to come down earlier than he would have liked. We all agree that it sure is nice we all get to go and fly again tomorrow. 

It's been a big day. Time to sleep now

Buenos noches!

Martín

Day 2 Tour 1

Clear with expected cumulus. 

The disco went on all night at the hotel. Opting not to wear earplugs may have been a bad call. I was in charge of roll call and didn't want to be late to breakfast this am. Fearing that I would sleep in, I instead managed to wake many times throughout the night and even dreamed of being late to some unrelated dream event. Sheeesh. 

Somewhat tired, I made it on time and everyone was accounted for at breakfast. My "late arrival" (Tyler) was at the breakfast table ready to fly with me tandem.  We left on time, arriving just as the day turned on, perfect. 

 

Rob took a local as he had no student scheduled. He was very excited. Xavier translated so they could launch, fly and land uneventfully. They had a great flight. 

The drive up was sunny with clouds moving in from the south. A great day ahead, it appeared to me. 

The groups all seemed to come together and flew well today. The air was turbulent with the strong thermals at times. We all flew around at cloudbase and really had fun. Everyone has much to say upon landing. 

Spencer was the last to land in our group. I was happy for everyone as they all had great flights of 2 hours or so. 

We hiked to the road and Flacko picked us up in minutes. We drive to Cipriano where we all transferred (+ gear) to his yellow bus and headed to town for chicken and juice, picking up another pilot on the way. 

Tyler showing off his greasy chicken fingers and juice technique. Skyler enjoying lunch too. 

Christian has a great time and it shows. 

John has adopted my favorite juice combo: mango y piña (pineapple). Mmm. 

 

I grabbed a few supplies from town and got back on the bus to the hotel, with plenty of time to cool off and relax before my presentation at 5:30. 

It is so nice here. So warm, sunny and the humidity is really not too bad. Flying near the clouds is so scenic and refreshingly cool too. Ahhhh. 

Hasta pronto,

Martín

Day 1 Tour 1

The day dawned bright and looked good.

Breakfast was a hoagie style sandwich with chicken or pork cutlets and red onions with some light vinegrette sauce.  Odd, but I finished mine knowing I'd be hungry very soon if I didn't. The 6:45 breakfast was a good call, despite the grogginess we all seemed to share. It made the difference between flying and not today for our group. 

Some had bright new wings to fly.

Some knew how to apply sunscreen!

We all launched and had a great first day of flying, but a group showing up behind us was met with wind 'over the back' making it unlaunchable. 

After a brief morning chat we took to the sky. Lots of blue today, steong climbs and higher than usual cloudbase for so early. I flew to 7,700 feet after launching from about 5,000 feet. Nice. 

Pell and I had a nice tandem together. 

The day seemed too good to be true. 

We flew well as a group but there were no clouds to mark lifting air out on the flats, so we stayed in the mountains until the increasing wind over the back forced us to take a chance for the flats after all. The flats remained with blue skies and no clouds. It was getting windier out of the North (down valley) and the weak thermals we found we're drifting pilots into a hard to retrieve area. Ultimately we all landed mostly together, except two pilots made it a bit farther and one of them (Juho) made it to the next town down wind of Roldanillo. Well done!

Pell and I had a less than soft landing due to switchy winds in our landing spot but were no worse for wear and later found out that we weren't the only ones that had a hard time with that landing zone. Gotta watch out for sure. 

Flacko and Cipriano were there in just minutes to pick us up. We stopped for some rotisserie chicken and fresh smoothies back in town. 

Our pilot meeting was held before (and after) dinner tonight as we couldn't do it the night before due to late arrivals who would have missed it. We still have two more late arrivals tonight, so they will have some catching up to do for sure. 

Lots of happy pilots today. Another early start tomorrow. 

Hasta mañana,

Martín

Arrival day

While I was sure the day would turn sunny, it did not, thwarting those that took a jeep to the launch, 45 minutes  away. 

For me, yesterday was spent going to town to get a few last supplies, including a lightbulb for my favorite lamp.

As I waked back to the hotel with Brian and Juho, I noticed that I wasn't feeling well, despite my happiness for them on their shopping successes. 

Juho with his $3 toilet seat (since his room didn't have one). Nice! Brian also scored some handy items too, like a plastic bucket to do laundry in. I may have to borrow that. Good call. 

Amazing how this stuff works.  I was so woosy that I skipped both lunch and dinner and spent the majority of the afternoon in bed all the way 'till the next morning. Marité (Rob's Wife) gave me the pepto and some chamomile tea right at dark. I also downed a glass of lime juice mixed with water earlier in the day to combat whatever had me so sapped. 

This am, my breakfast was a banana and some mango slices with some unsweetened juice. All systems go! I could have flown today but I wanted to be sure and rest up some more. All good. I had homemade chicken soup for lunch and a full dinner tonight. I'm back!

 

Unfortunately, Rob isn't feeling well now, and spent much of today resting too. I hope he will be feeling better overnight like I did. 

Farmer, Dave and Juho inspect the frozen treats cooler.  Mmmmm. 

Half the pilots arrived tonight and we had a nice dinner.  The last half of the pilots should be here at 10pm.  We will get them checked in and meet at 6:45am sharp for breakfast. 7:30 we load the bus and chase jeep, and we depart at 7:45.  All times are 15 minutes earlier this year due to a drier year hear in Colombia and making sure we are launching by 9:30ish to get airborne before the air gets strong. 

Wishing you well as we settle in for the night.  Tomorrow we fly as Team Eagle!

Sueños dulces,

Martín

Day 3 prep

Today dawned brighter than usual, and was very good for flying for those that went up.  One pilot not in our group who is staying here said he had a tangled brake line that he could not fix and wisely opted to land ASAP safely while is other two friends has long uneventful flights. 

We had a lealisurly breakfast consisting of papaya juice and slices with Apple and banana and a ham and cheese omelette.

We kept busy with more preparations.

We tackled the phone set up for our guests and inventoried all the phones. We verified SIM cards, charged batteries and made sure we had it all working. 

Maya kept us entertained or maybe the other way around? She's so cute!

My phone needed to be backed up and then restored with a new local SIM card in order to work. Problem was, the wifi to back it up is so slow, it would take around 15 hours or more. The people at the phone shop recommended I drive 40 minutes to Cartago, to have the main office for the "Movistar" network do some high tech magic to make it work.  I tried deleting a bunch of photos so it could back up the data faster but no dice. Rob was super helpful and suggested to just get a travel phone to remedy this problem. We found lots of decent phones for not a lot of cash on his laptop. In the end, Julian the lead server in the dining area helped me pick out a low priced android smart phone so I could fulfill my guide duties and check pilots in when they landed safely. I will once again be able to talk, text and pull up all our shared data on the go. Whew. 

Dave Tuener arrived in time to have dinner with us as did Brian Howell. 

Dave's gliders got lost on the three flights to get down here, after leaving Mammoth with three new feet of snow there, on a motorcycle with all his stuff. Of course he brought an extra front tire too, as it was getting bald, and as expected, he changed the front tire himself, on the way to make his first flight out of Sanfrancisco. Nice!

Brian arrived with all his gear since he had been flying all last week in nearby Roldanillo with his brother and other pilots staying there. Farmer should arrive tomorrow and we will finalize details and ghave a staff meeting on Friday. 

That's it for now. Flying is coming up soon. Lots to do on the ground first. 

Hasta mañana!

Martín

Arrival and the next morning

A very loud bell was ringing in the jetway as we boarded. It was steady and piercing, then intermittent. Finally just occasional until it finally stopped. We were sure Ashton Kutchure was about to show up, but he didn't. Probably best. 

Night had fallen and it looked clear after the rain earlier today.

LA looks better at night, I think. 

As the sun rose Five hours later, it looked clear, but at 35,000 feet, it usually does.

A blanket of clouds with some imbedded storms coverd the ground below.

Panamá has an impressive skyline that I never noticed on previous trips. Cool.

It looked hot and humid outside, but we would only see the inside of the air conditioned terminal before boarding our connecting flight to Cali.

In less than an hour, we are climbing in a smaller jet with only a few passengers bound for Colombia and there was some slight turbulence as we climbed through the morning cumulus clouds already forming. As we made our approach an hour later, we hit some moderate to severe turbulence and the passengers responded with shrieks and called out to Mother Mary, and one or two of the Trinity for suport. Now that's turbulence!

It was awesome. The flight crew was still chatting about it as we all cleared customs. Juho and I were as well.

As we exchanged some currency I saw our driver Noberto waiting just ouside and pointed to my watch indicating a few minutes more, and he smiled back saying, "No  problema."

It was a 2.5 hour drive but Noberto took great care of us in his air conditioned pickup and stopped at a fruit stand along the way. A local woman prepared a fresh pineapple and put it into a plastic bag. We put on the plastic gloves she gave us and proceeded to feel like we were in fruit heaven as we bit into the golden sweet discs. Ahhhhhh.

We reached the hotel at around 2:30 local time.  The sky was awesome looking and we saw a pilot or two flying above.  It's on!  We checked in, settled in a bit and later walked down to town to set up our phones with local SIM cards and get dinner and supplies. A half rotisserie chicken and a pitcher of mango pineapple juice were all we needed to call it a night as we walked back up to the hotel. Perfect.

I decorated my room a little with this sweet card from my youngest who told me to wait to open it when I got on the bus (but not before). Went to bed around 10:00pm. Woke up around 6:30. Just right.

I could hear the pool guy scooting around with his supplies and took a shot of the morning sky.  Looks like a perfect day ahead.  We will prepare for the arrival of our first group on the 5th. We need to be ready to fly every day for each group until the following group arrives, it has already been a great season here with two comps finishing up just ahead of my arrival. It has been somewhat drier here this year, which means stronger thermals, and higher cloudbase than usual. Looking good.

Ciao para ahora, (bye for now).

Martín

Departure day

Tandem, check. Solo wing, check. Carry on, check. Personal item (back pack), check. 

Smooches and goodbyes to my girls, (sniffle), check. 

After a morning deluge of rain today, the clouds parted and near gale force winds ensued. As I recall it rained on the bus ride down last year too. So it is eerily similar to last time. A good omen I think. 

 This time around, however, I'm riding the bus solo to LAX where I will rendezvous with Juho. Last time I rode (and flew) with my esteemed colleague Brian who is known lovingly in Colombia as "the pilot of the Bumblebee Tandem" (El Piloto del bipleza abeja?).  Brian left a week ahead of me to go play and warm up, so to speak, ahead of the tours. Nice. 

We had time for some Wolfgang Puck's pizza.  Seemed expensive till we tried it. 

Juho works with Eagle in Santa Barbara and is a solid pilot and van driver extraordinaire. He should be only flying and not driving on this trip, though I suspect he will be super helpful nonetheless. 

We found a comfy couch with an outlet--A true premium experience at the airport. 

Got a full charge on the phone just as it is time to board. Gotta go!