X-Pyr Day 6-7 /EN/

...or how the drudgery finished!

Sixth morning… and it looks like all the previous mornings, broken, tired, looking like a ghost. It’s still dark when I’m setting off, as today a lengthy walk, without any bright prospects of flying, lies ahead of me. I’m literary ruining my body along the asphalt until I meet Jessie, who caught up with me.

We walk to the saddle during the whole morning; sometimes it’s raining cats and dogs, sometimes it’s just drizzling. At least we use the time to talk about our experience, where we’ve been and what we plan. For me it was a really interesting debate. Jessie is from Seattle and the mountains there are just round the corner of his house, so we also mentioned that maybe I would like to visit the US to try the conditions there as I’m fascinated by the diverse and vast nature… And to fly it with a wing… hell yeah! That would be something.

We both are dreamers with similar ideas and goals. What’s more Jessie’s support, Mr Cibulka, specifically his family name, sounded somehow familiar to me; he must come from somewhere here (I mean Slovakia or Czech Rep.). And as I learn, this guy was the support of X-Apls athlete Honza Rejmanek. The world is really small!!

After few hours and sixteen kilometres of walking we reach the saddle at 2,000 m. Few kilometres to the west we can see a nice “puffed” cloud and it must be really photogenic, as there’s one flash of light after another. We run, together with Jessie, from the saddle on the hill. Every second is crucial, I would say.

I have never experienced such a flash unpacking, and it would be worth it to time it. In 20 seconds, for sure, Avaxiáš is above my head and let’s go into the air. In front of me there are clouds, I soared few meters and jumped over backwards, and Jessie takes off, as well. We fly next to the slope, below us there are high voltage power lines. I don’t have my glasses and it started to rain, I can see a big bullshit, since all the water pours into my unprotected eyes. I feel like in a wild river, with groundspeed around 60-80 km/h.

We fly down the valley like missiles, now and then I’m taken a bit up at a turn, what makes me happy but worried as well. Behind me there’s that cloud and I really don’t want to be sucked into it. So I fly rather full speed, so that the others “can’t laugh at me”. I land just before the rain changes to a downpour, and when I say downpour, I mean a real one. Happy as a clam I pack the wing and I’m glad that I’ve flown 1,200 m of elevation and 13 km in five minutes. I’m happy also because everything went good and nothing bad happened, this is called pure luck. Since thirty seconds after we took off it started to hail, and to be honest, flying in hailstorm is something I haven’t managed yet :D

Next few hours, as Jessie said, can be described as sharing our misery on an asphalt road. Finally we split, unplanned, and there the party starts. I’m in such a narrow valley that my GPs doesn’t want to work, the trail gets lost somewhere in the overgrown gardens and steep hill, there’s another storm chasing me, and I’m tired.

I decided to climb a 2,500 m high mountain (1,800 m of climbing ahead of me!), from where it would be possible to fly tomorrow. I managed to climb to 1,800 m AMSL and I’m done, knees are fucked, soles are swollen and just to make it more interesting also the eyes had hard times. In the morning I look like an old toper, swollen face, purulent eyes (result of the bombing water in storm without glasses and overall exhaustion).
Walked approx. 32 km, climbed 3,000 m, flown 13 km.

And there we go! The last day! I don’t know whether I should be happy nor not… I want to fly! In the morning the clouds are 500 m below the mountain, and it’s blowing like hell. In fact, I wouldn’t mind the wind, but the clouds are in unknown terrain and that’s not worth it. The overall exhaustion can be seen also in the decision making. I can think neither critically nor constructively. Support is catching up on their sleep and I wait at those 2,200 m until 11, then the clouds start to drop even lower and so I decided to descend on foot as there’s no chance to catch up with the guys ahead of me. Moreover, there’s the crucial jump, which I won’t probably manage with headwind. The walk through the wild national park is breathtaking, nothing hurts, as my head is so tired that is eliminates perception that dulls it. Maybe the headache is again from thirsty...thirsty which felt by Odin in halfway to Valhalla! :D 
Note:
Typical Spanish-Xpyr-competition day...thirsty and heat :D

Maybe it even saved me from making some bullshits. Since Jessie landed in trees on his reserve in strong wind… just for illustration :D

In the evening I want to fly down from a saddle but the take off is shitty, it blows like from mammut ass and in the wrong direction and the landing spots are already in the forbidden area. All the others are 40-50 km behind me as the crows fly and grounded… therefore end, ende, schluss! Terminal station! Ragnarok is over.

The feeling of liberation from the misery, continual starving and fatigue. But it was super cool, engrossing and strengthening. Team spirit supported by shared misery was born. Many new friendships forged in tough conditions were born. Many new experiences, which moved at least me to a completely new mental as well as physical level, were born. Because it was not only once, when I realised how close I was to killing myself.

I thank you all, you, who helped me somehow, and there are loads of you! Tandem passengers, sponsors, family, friends, those giving me lift when hitch-hiking, my team. Zajo helped me most, giving me a bunch of equipment that I tested, for example the new MERINO in which I sweated maybe hectolitres. I want to thank Gradient for a wing which hasn’t let me down in difficult and even impossible weather conditions and thanks to my brother, who designed it. Thanks a lot Avax! I want to thank Skybean for helping me with their superb devices, cameras and enthusiasm.

I want to thank all my readers, who felt like reading this entire staff and being in the shoes of a shy straw-haired Ďuro from Kremnica, who decided to try it and “fight” against blokes from all over the world.

In Port de la Selva we find out that among the best and also not so good competitors, i mean myself, we ended up on sixth place!

It’s said that we also deserved some kind of admiration for our brave feats, mainly for the flights which seemed reckless, but in fact they were all well thought-out 

Especially my big thanks to: Inigo, for great idea to make X-pyr, to choose me after all that all annyoning messages I write to him and for great organization. 
My support team: Marek and Jakub and all on the net faraway there, to help me, to cook me, to wash my clothes and spend time there, in those faraway Hispanic-Gauls lands.  Zuzana for this great translation, which bring my word across the globe :D. Competitors which share their knowledge, humour and time with us.

     IT WAS AN HONOUR!