Reserve Clinic and Other Stuff
For the third year in a row today I attended the annual Muller Windsports Reserve Clinic held at a local community centre.
The clinic provides a great opportunity for pilots new and old, to throw their reserve out of their harness, which is hung on a contraption made of two ladders and a wooden pole. Vincene was saying how this year the number of successful deployments was excellent as opposed to previous years. It's scary to think how many pilots are flying around with reserves that are not properly deployable - one can only hope they never have to use them in real-life situations.
The reserve clinic is great because it's nice and social - you catch up with people you haven't seen since the fall and dream about the adventures that await in the summer. Since I've got back from the Dominican, I've been very frustrated with Canadian weather - it's really clear now how truly short our flying season is out here and how we do live in a very frigid part of the world! When I left for the Canary Islands, it was winter. When I returned, it was winter. When I left for the Dominican, it was winter. When I returned, it was still winter. Will it ever end?
Anyway, so yes, I do enjoy the social aspect of paragliding. Surprisingly, Doug showed up at the clinic - it was fantastic to see him out of a hospital bed and walking (albeit with cane in hand). What a nice surprise! I'm so happy that he's doing so well, and that normalcy is returning to his life. Because he's such a talented pilot and he was still misfortunate out in Costa Rica, I think his accident made a lot of us re-think paragliding safety and understand how quickly things can turn sour with only one small error in judgement. It's just good to have him back - I hope he decides to continue flying.
Speaking of flying mishaps, having to repeat the story of my incident with power lines in Lanzarote was something I could have done without today. Yes, it's important that others learn from my mistake and don't repeat it and that of course I never make the same mistake again, but that accident tends to hang over my head like a dark cloud which just won't go away. My goal for this year is to do something really special - fly a long XC, or do a cool acro move, or win something at a competition - anything! I really need something to offset that Canary Islands shit show - emotionally that accident still tends to haunt me.
So, I'm still debating whether or not to go to the Panorama Easter meet. For some strange reason, I have a bit of an aversion to skiing, and I don't really know why. I suppose that considering the number of times I've done it, I'm pretty decent, but there's just something about the sport that doesn't click. I guess with the Easter meet, it's one of those things where if the weather sucked and it wasn't flyable, I don't see myself making good use of that lift ticket. Besides that, there's always the financial considerations and although the weekend out at Panorama would be 'cheap', when you don't have that extra disposable income, you pay much more attention to where your pennies are going.
That's not to say my paragliding budget fund is empty - funding for a new wing is available! This is something that still "in the works" and I hope to find out more soon. Spring always reminds me of change and new beginnings - it would be so fitting to have a new wing to fly.
Ahhh, I've had my blog fix - it's always nice to share my inner ramblings.
The clinic provides a great opportunity for pilots new and old, to throw their reserve out of their harness, which is hung on a contraption made of two ladders and a wooden pole. Vincene was saying how this year the number of successful deployments was excellent as opposed to previous years. It's scary to think how many pilots are flying around with reserves that are not properly deployable - one can only hope they never have to use them in real-life situations.
The reserve clinic is great because it's nice and social - you catch up with people you haven't seen since the fall and dream about the adventures that await in the summer. Since I've got back from the Dominican, I've been very frustrated with Canadian weather - it's really clear now how truly short our flying season is out here and how we do live in a very frigid part of the world! When I left for the Canary Islands, it was winter. When I returned, it was winter. When I left for the Dominican, it was winter. When I returned, it was still winter. Will it ever end?
Anyway, so yes, I do enjoy the social aspect of paragliding. Surprisingly, Doug showed up at the clinic - it was fantastic to see him out of a hospital bed and walking (albeit with cane in hand). What a nice surprise! I'm so happy that he's doing so well, and that normalcy is returning to his life. Because he's such a talented pilot and he was still misfortunate out in Costa Rica, I think his accident made a lot of us re-think paragliding safety and understand how quickly things can turn sour with only one small error in judgement. It's just good to have him back - I hope he decides to continue flying.
Speaking of flying mishaps, having to repeat the story of my incident with power lines in Lanzarote was something I could have done without today. Yes, it's important that others learn from my mistake and don't repeat it and that of course I never make the same mistake again, but that accident tends to hang over my head like a dark cloud which just won't go away. My goal for this year is to do something really special - fly a long XC, or do a cool acro move, or win something at a competition - anything! I really need something to offset that Canary Islands shit show - emotionally that accident still tends to haunt me.
So, I'm still debating whether or not to go to the Panorama Easter meet. For some strange reason, I have a bit of an aversion to skiing, and I don't really know why. I suppose that considering the number of times I've done it, I'm pretty decent, but there's just something about the sport that doesn't click. I guess with the Easter meet, it's one of those things where if the weather sucked and it wasn't flyable, I don't see myself making good use of that lift ticket. Besides that, there's always the financial considerations and although the weekend out at Panorama would be 'cheap', when you don't have that extra disposable income, you pay much more attention to where your pennies are going.
That's not to say my paragliding budget fund is empty - funding for a new wing is available! This is something that still "in the works" and I hope to find out more soon. Spring always reminds me of change and new beginnings - it would be so fitting to have a new wing to fly.
Ahhh, I've had my blog fix - it's always nice to share my inner ramblings.
posted by Veronica at 4:19 PM
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