Holidays and absences [3]

Very cool pics, chris! Looks like a fun trip.

halfwise wrote:When you first showed that picture of Shanghai I thought it was the Wall Street bull.  I was going "Wha....?"   Pollution isn't looking too bad in Beijing.  Did you take the bobsled ride down from the Great Wall?

No i didn't take the bobsled down, but i wish i had taken one up

Not really, was really glad i did it. Once in a lifetime experience.

The bird's nest. Olympic Park Beijing.

So I was at the Great Wall a few years back, at a conference that of course organized the trip for us.  A bus, leaving on a strict schedule, with forlorn hope of ever finding out way back if we missed it.  They weren't counting noses: either we made it or we didn't.

So anyway, there I was with some folks on the Great Wall, and the bus was leaving in maybe 30 minutes, and I see this bobsled ride going down from the highest hill, weaving through the trees.  I was all in a lather to do it, and figured it would get me down in plenty of time to maybe buy some souvenirs or something.  Nobody else was interested. So down I go.

I get off, look around in the parking lot where I was, and realized it wasn't the same parking lot with the bus!.  I'm on the opposite side of the damn wall, a wall designed to divide entire countries, in a much smaller parking lot, with no clear way to get to the main parking lot. We had walked a long way along the wall from the entry point. Sweat is beading my brow as I calculate the bus was leaving in maybe 15 minutes.

In a panic I find a taxi and maybe someone to interpret (I don't honestly remember how I communicated, it was all a blur at this point) to take me back to the main parking lot.

He drove me a few hundred yards and deposited me within sight of the bus, and charged me $20 (I may have offered that up front if he'd just get me there fast).  I could have walked it in 5 minutes if I had any clue.

Good story.

One taxi driver wanted to charge us $50 to get back from the shops. We managed to find someone who did it for $20.

The Forbidden City.

Hope you noticed the T-shirt i was wearing?

Wouldn't have it you hadn't pointed it out. Ancientry meets ancient tree.

it's so cute when people use this as their blog <3 this community <3

Definitely a good shirt choice.

Norc wrote:it's so cute when people use this as their blog <3 this community <3

Nobody else out there has as much connection. This place is special. Sure, I have other groups for hang gliding and such, but even though those are some of my best friends, it's not quite the same bond. This is more personal somehow.

Hang gliding sounds like fun. You must have a video of you doing it somewhere. Would love to do it, but don't think i could. I get dizzy standing on a chair. Same as parachuting would be great, but the fear.

Good on them that's has done it. Must be awesome.

{{{Only consolation to the thought of me hang-gliding is that no one would be able to hear my girlish screams of terror- not above the sound of me shitting myself! }}}

chris63 wrote:Hang gliding sounds like fun. You must have a video of you doing it somewhere. Would love to do it, but don't think i could. I get dizzy standing on a chair. Same as parachuting would be great, but the fear.

Good on them that's has done it. Must be awesome.  

I don't have a video of me doing it since I've never gotten a go pro.  But you can see me off to the left of this video, helping a guy launch.  We were doing what's called a "cloud dive", and I had to talk him through it - the key is to wait until the clouds have broken enough that you can see where you are going.



Here's a video of a friend of mine taking a tandem with another friend of mine.



Again, I'm off to the left.  This last one gives a good sense of what it feels like. At the beginning he's circling in a thermal in order to climb.

chris63 wrote:Hope you noticed the T-shirt i was wearing?

 great pictures too.

Blimey ! that bloke in the last video was going at a cracking speed as he landed !
I couldn't do that unless I was strapped with a partner but, Id love to have a go. I cant drive, never had the guts to learn not with the traffic these days, right load of fecking idiots on the road but, Id love to have learnt to fly an airplane when I was younger I don't think my bloomers could hold it now I'm older Petty would be shitting himself & Id be peeing myself ! LOL

Believe it or not it's safer to come in faster. There can be turbulence near the ground, and if your glider is going much faster than those local deviations in air speed then you don't notice them so much. The key is to ensure that YOU are in control rather than Mother Nature at that point. So while more speed can cause more damage, hitting a tree instead of skimming well-groomed ground is worse.

O_O you'd never get me up in one of those! faster is safer?!

Not only is faster safer, higher is safer.  More time to fix things before hitting the only danger, which is the ground.   Some things are counter-intuitive before you do it, but become ingrained once it becomes a natural extension of your body.  

For instance if I'm flying slow to minimize sink rate (higher speed means more lift but even more drag - so your rate of potential energy loss increases), but get hit by some kind of turbulence so that I find myself in an uncommanded turn straight towards the ridge ( ), I actually dive to put on as much speed as I can as I'm heading towards that damn ridge so that I have the control to turn away from it, in a very exciting tight turn that nearly puts you up on a wing-tip. It's counter-intuitive at first. This is why we slowly introduce people to more interesting conditions.

{{{{No buggering way! Not a hope in hell Halfy would you get me doing that!! Only plus would be in a kilt I dont have to worry about bringing clean pants but I dont think you'd want to be my instructor attached to me at the time! }}}

The instructor does tend to hang lower than the passenger.

But honestly, it's not scary except in rare circumstances you try to avoid. It's exactly like that dream of flying we all have. But awake.

We have hang gliding where I live. On good days its fun to see all those bodkins up in the fresh air swirling about. Each 'wing' is a different colour & it can look really pretty, mesmerising
http://www.southdownshanggliding.co.uk/

This skit was done down our way

Aw, they have towing which makes it easier to take a tandem. Go take a tandem ride, Az! (a bit pricy, but a once in a lifetime experience).

That hill looks beautiful, btw, makes me want to fly. A big open launch like that is just irresistible.