Learning to Fly

Pulled the Plug

Daniel and I got up the ramp a little later then planned after stopping for a swim at a waterfall on the way up the hill with Jussara, Lu, André and Angélica.

When we got up there the hill was packed with tourists there for their Carnaval break and those that had come to fly were already way up above the ramp. Daniel and I didn’t want to waste any time and quickly prepped and took off in the light northwesterly.

As soon as I had left the ramp I realised I had made a mistake. After the stronger winds the last couple of times I had taken off, and seeing all the other pilots way up high, I was just expecting to rise, and hadn’t even looked at what the conditions were actually like. I sank slightly and quickly searched around looking for somewhere to rise. I went right along the ridge toward a rocky area and managed to rise a little.

I circled round for a while and struggled back and forth trying to get some more altitude, but never got much above the ramp. I could see the others up higher but just couldn’t get there. I looked around and Daniel seemed to be a little higher but was in a strong downdraft, and it wasn’t long before he was struggling at the foot of the range.

I searched around for a bit, but nothing was around, and so when Daniel called out over the radio, I went over toward him. I found one last thermal breaking off the ridge line, and got up a bit, but never enough to get back to the ramp. It wasn’t long after that that I was forced to land beside Daniel.

I was pretty disappointed, but looking around I saw that all the other pilots that were way above us were also descending and landing. It was like someone had cut the power and all the thermals had stopped working. We thought about going back up to the ramp but had no idea how long it would be before things got good again, so we gave up and all went to the Fazenda Aldeia for lunch.

Total flight time: 20mins