Photos and more

Thursday I got the message that my new Litespeed 3.5s sail had arrived at Michi Friesenbichlers place in Graz, so I packed my gear, jumped into the car and raced to Graz. At least I intended to. Since the summer holidays have started in Europe, there are traffic jams everywhere, expecially down south. With me in the middle of it.
Late I arrived in Birkfeld, found the sail, went on to Graz to pick up Jamie and kept driving with her to Greifenburg. We arrived at 1am and were very happy that Bettina had already prepared some beds for us where we could crash.
The next day was one of the hottest days of the year, and I had to put the new sail on my glider. Many drops of sweat landed on the crispy new sail... but with Jamies and Herberts help we finally got the sail on, met a Journalist from Frankfurter Rundschau who is going to write an article about my flying and went up Emberger Alm together after having checked the weather.
The prediction was for strong southwesterlies, and when we arrived at takeoff, I decided it is too strong to fly. Even the German League had cancelled the day already, a good decision.
We sat down in Wolfgangs Cafe and started talking about everything connected to flying. We waited for the photographer, but even when he arrived at 4pm, the wind was still too strong, so we drove down again and started putting on all the stickers: Red Bull, Adidas, Timezone and Lizard.
The next morning, we started at 5.20 am and went up Emberger Alm, because the light is best in the morning and evening Samo the photographer said. I set up my beautiful new glider, all alone, just a curious fox looking at us, and Samo fixed his camera.
At 8am, there was enough wind from the right direction to take off even with the heavy camera equipment. I had a remote control for the camera and took about 300 (!) shots on the way down. We were very pleased with the first results, great new action shots for the Red Bull photo files! At 10.30, I took off the second time, now the camera on the keel. I managed to just get up above take off, but with the heavy camera I got tired pretty fast and decided to safely land and save my energy for the third and last flight.
Samo got a radio and told me how to fly where so he could take some photos from the ground, while i took some more pics in the air, flying around steep rocks.
I was exhausted when I landed, but after a red bull I had enough energy for the portrait photos. They also turned out really nice, so the long day of work had been successful.
On the way back to Munich, Jamie and I stopped in the mountains and found some fresh chanterelle and porcini mushrooms for dinner- I used them for risotto. The last porcini mushroom we found was nearly too perfect to eat!
At the moment, Im on my way to Frankfurt because I have to work tomorrow, flying to Bangalore. I already look forward to some great food!Photos and more
Thursday I got the massage that my new Litespeed 3.5s sail had arrived at Michi Friesenbichlers place in Graz, so I packed my gear, jumped into the car and raced to Graz. At least I intended to. Since the summer holidays have started in Europe, there are traffic jams everywhere, expecially down south. With me in the middle of it.
Late I arrived in Birkfeld, found the sail, went on to Graz to pick up Jamie and kept driving with her to Greifenburg. We arrived at 1am and were very happy that Bettina had already prepared some beds for us where we could crash.
The next day was one of the hottest days of the year, and I had to put the new sail on my glider. Many drops of sweat landed on the crispy new sail... but with Jamies and Herberts help we finally got the sail on, met a Journalist from Frankfurter Rundschau who is going to write an article about my flying and went up Emberger Alm together after having checked the weather.
The prediction was for strong southwesterlies, and when we arrived at takeoff, I decided it is too strong to fly. Even the German League had cancelled the day already, a good decision.
We sat down in Wolfgangs Cafe and started talking about everything connected to flying. We waited for the photographer, but even when he arrived at 4pm, the wind was still too strong, so we drove down again and started putting on all the stickers: Red Bull, Adidas, Timezone and Lizard.
The next morning, we started at 5.20 am and went up Emberger Alm, because the light is best in the morning and evening Samo the photographer said. I set up my beautiful new glider, all alone, just a curious fox looking at us, and Samo fixed his camera.
At 8am, there was enough wind from the right direction to take off even with the heavy camera equipment. I had a remote control for the camera and took about 300 (!) shots on the way down. We were very pleased with the first results, great new action shots for the Red Bull photo files! At 10.30, I took off the second time, now the camera on the keel. I managed to just get up above take off, but with the heavy camera I got tired pretty fast and decided to safely land and save my energy for the third and last flight.
Samo got a radio and told me how to fly where so he could take some photos from the ground, while i took some more pics in the air, flying around steep rocks.
I was exhausted when I landed, but after a red bull I had enough energy for the portrait photos. They also turned out really nice, so the long day of work had been successful.
On the way back to Munich, Jamie and I stopped in the mountains and found some fresh chanterelle and porcini mushrooms for dinner- I used them for risotto. The last porcini mushroom we found was nearly too perfect to eat!
At the moment, Im on my way to Frankfurt because I have to work tomorrow, flying to Bangalore. I already look forward to some great food!