Saturday 29thAugust.
Go-on............Admit it.............I bet you've always wanted to fly over your house aboard your paraglider, and seen your little home patch from that special perspective that a paraglider gives you!!
Strong Westerley forecast everywhere, -- BUT
? quieter early on?? Awoke early to see this area just east of Carmarthen looking relatively benign. So off I set to the moors on the little road from Llanllwni up to Rhydcymerau - beautiful area - way out sticks, hoping to get airborne on the paramotor. It was howling when I got there, so did a fair bit of ground handling of the reflex wing (Dudek Reaction) with trimmers on full fast! All very lively stuff! Stuart from Carmarthen, turned up & so we drank coffee in his van. We gave up & headed home. I passed through Porthyrhyd on the way home, and noticed it was more sheltered, and a large flat field, silage cut and with an open and inviting gate, beckoned enticingly! Should I give it a try??? - knowing I was almost guaranteed of getting pinned on getting up high. I went for it, and got air-borne on my 3rd attempt in a soggy field. This was the first time I've felt the confidence to attempt a take-off in my home vicinity, and I'd chosen rather crap conditions to do it!! It is such an amazing feeling taking off from a flat field!! Sure enough, I was quickly in to the strong stuff - so trimmers on to full fast ASAP. My flight plan was to crawl upwind for a while and then shoot back downwind for a landing back at the car. Managed a slow 1 mile upwind passing to the side of the Llanddarog (my home village) annual agricultural show
.Whoppee - managed to fly over my house!!![/b]
You always fly a paramotor expecting the engine to cut out on you at any time - and that's exactly what happened to me. Landed OK in a large empty field, again very soggy and muddy. Turned out my plug cap had come off! Neither that, nor the soggy walk out, was going to damp my satisfaction about achieving this first local flight!! (Just pick better conditions next time, Jones!!)
The 2 lads from Carmarthen, Stuart & his dad, Nigel, are off to Portugal next week for paramotor training with Paul Mahony, and they might even get some coastal paragliding as well.
