...or fly when the others are scared because of the weather…
Our camping site is so awesome that I’m now jealous of it. Next to a burbling icy cold brooklet with beautiful scenery of rocks taking my breath away and Marek is close to tears as he doesn’t have the gear with him and there’s no time for climbing. As I’m walking up the mountain, not really awake, I jump from rock to rock, catching up with a Spaniard breathing heavily like puffs from a steam locomotive. He can’t speak the imperialistic (English) language very well so the discussion isn’t wort a dime.
It’s a pity that it blows quite heavily trough the saddle I’m about the
cross and reach the ridge… maybe too heavily. Well, saddle, morning… it’ll get
better, I think naively…
But the saddle is like a gate into another world… plateau… and on the
right and on the left I see rocky scenery and wind is pushing against me. On
the rocks, just by the way, some vultures are sitting and croaking at one
another. Now and then some of them get bored, take wings and soar to the
eastern slope and at nine they climb not much of a thermal with the crosswind
and disappear.
As I’m walking I’m looking for some water source… well, none, as usually
and I have only one litre left and one and a half hour until the take off.
I have two options for the take off. The first one includes taking off
from a rocky cliff with the wing in the lee and actually down the hill since
the summit is vertical from the south and in falls immediately, although with
the grassy part but full of sharp limestone razor blades perfect for cutting
the wing lines. The other option is quite a nice but pretty steep meadow not
far away, but it’s right above the ridge, which won’t do any good, I mean, once
there will be a thermal from SW, then from SE, that’s not good. Since there’s
plenty of time I unpack my staff, the trekking poles serve as a construction and
my primaloft is hung between them and creates emergency shade. Because you
know, besides water there’s nothing here, not even a bush, just rocks, stones,
stones once again and few clumps of grass here and there. Why do I mention it
that much? You know, I walked around like an idiot because it was always the
same story. I saw a place bit farther that looked better than the one I just
arrived at… few clumps of grass were hiding all the rocks from my view. So I made
next ten steps and saw that it’s not much better. But, look, that spot seems to
be better… so I walked and walked and all my hopes for a better spot for my Avax were in vain.
At half past eleven I unpack the wing but I’m not sure about that… those
few clumps of grass are lying on the ground like nailed, the birds of prey are
soaring at 1/3 the wing area and as soon as they spread their wings fully, they disapear somewhere behind the ridge… :D It’s simply blowing like from the asses
of all thirty-seven Hannibal’s elephants that were passing by to Rome years
ago, all at once… fortunately they are now six feet under but still kind of
breathing too heavily. After few tries and few close encounters of the third
kind with rocks, I manage to get the wing into the flight mode, and in the last
moment it drops down like a stone. That wouldn’t have finished well, I mean, it
would be way too bloody.
What to do next? It looks like my livetrack isn’t working; there’s
almost no signal even for my phone so I gave it a thought. Finally, I decide to
traverse approx. 1,800 m along the ridge in the right direction. Why? I don’t
feel like walking down the valley to take some water and lose 1,000 m of
altitude and right away climb 500 m up another ridge. So I’m breaking my legs
walking along chamois trails, gravel, rocks and other comfy staff. I just watch
my steps, as once I almost slipped on a gravel field and only then I noticed
that the slope can be something like 45° steep and after two meters of gravel
there’s a precipice steep like hell, so if I have really tried it, I would have
finished like minced meat for sausages.
Well, never mind, I have to go on and concentrate more, not just walk. I
reached a spot where the wind was not that bad, there’s even some grass, not
only rocks, but what’s even better is that I’m hidden behind a ridge, which
calms down the wind a bit, and the lower altitude is also an advantage. Of
course I’m scared like hell; all my determination was consumed by the one-hour
attempt to take off in 12 m/s. My heart sank with the thoughts: what if there is
no chance with the headwind? Behind me, there are slopes, cliffs, precipices
full of sharp rock, but the main thing is that I’ve never seen them before,
only from satellite :D I can say for sure that I won’t be able to land, for
sure not behind the main ridge… How it is blowing up there? I can only guess
with certainty that is almost uncertain...there’s not even a single could,
which could help me to figure out the speed and direction.
Not for the first time and not for the last I leave the ground with just
one wish… Did I guess it correctly, didn’t I!?!
I’m taken upwards straight ahead like smoke through the chimney, taken
by the thermal towards the bright blue sky. When I look at it now, I can say
that it wasn’t that bad, sure, the thermals were strong, the wind as well, but
nothing that couldn’t be managed somehow. You know, the determination or the
general mental toughness is like any other muscle; it can get tired or
exhausted. I climb a bit, try as hard as possible. While jumping over the first
valley, besides thinking about that bullshit I’ve just made, I’m watching the
narrow valley behind me full of trees and rocks. Good for me, I’m not about to
land. On the next ridge I’m a bit braver and climb into maybe 2,700 – 2,800. I
try as hard as possible to get to the next beautiful rocky ridge, the last one
before the jump backwards into the mountains to get the TP3, Anayet.
Two-and-half-thousand-meter-high mountain not far from Candachú. I climb a
strong thermal along with a glider into maybe 3,500 and it disappears like a
shot and I’m getting nailed down to the ground. Well… I flew over to another
mountain from that altitude, climbed a bit… took a deep breath and let’s go
with the wind backwards again. Groundspeed around 70 km/h. Great! The thermal
right before the TP makes LEGO out of me; I do everything possible and
impossible. If I was standing on the ground, one would think that I’m
practising for Spartakiad… I’m watching the wing and listening to skydrop all
the time… when it’s over I have 8plus meter… in the half turn it gives me 3.5
m/s down, that is 10 m/s difference in just 3 seconds… mmm… I’d call it a
Spanish washing machine. I swear to myself that after turning Anayet I will
land, it’s not worth it… now there’s only one thing on my mind, to escape
without getting killed. Looking backwards: it wasn’t that bad, but I was shit-scared
and that played a role. Well, what to add… I pushed my limits, again...
I barely manage to catch a glimpse of a certain giant, Pic du Mudi du
Osssau. What a monolith of pure rock, that is something! I guess it has
something like 400-500 m and is towering from a grassy plateau like a king from
ancient times. I’m woken up from this
romantic dreaming by Avaxiáš underneath me… Heyy, watch out! When I manage to
get it into the correct position again, happy as a clam, I’m watching towards
an open and pretty landing-friendly valley. I land on a beach, with shaking
legs, trembling voice and bleeding nose. I put myself together and continue
running along a dam. Legs relaxed a bit and with adrenaline in my blood I can
continue bravely on the ground. After maybe 10 km I see three locals flying,
well I should rather say, standing in the air high above the valley. Truth be
told, I wouldn’t have got much farther, and if… I would have had no place to
land. I overtook few guys; I’m alive and healthy… What a beautiful day!
In the evening, Guiseppe is trying to land flying backwards on big ears
and full speed, Zlatko rather landed after few meters.
We set up a camp underneath a 2,000 m high mountain, from which I would
like to leapfrog in the morning because there will be a front, so I want to be
up as soon as possible and fly at least something. We are caught up by the
organiser, they want some videos J
Evergreen of the contest cuisine, pasta with everything you can imagine
and let’s go into my brand new sleeping bag. Sweet dreams!
I walked approx. 27 km, climbed 700 m and flew around 35 km, not the
best performance, but I didn’t kill myself J
The first three guys are far, far away, flying in weaker wind, and so
they finished just before TP7 today. Maurer even managed to fly down into the
valley…
NEXT DAY--->
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