Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Parawaiting Claims Pilot

Dehydrated pilot found at Cactus launch waiting for the north wind that was reported to be on its way. It appeared to be another first, solo air space flight, no one was around … hmm … wonder why?

Mad Dog had scored 3 flights, 3 sites in 2 days while the rest of us, the monkeys that is, looked on or sledded, so I thought, well maybe I will get a flight today.

When I got to Cactus, it felt ok, not great but ok, so I hurried and laid out, tried to kite but no chance, it just would not load.

While parawaiting, I got hot, so off with the suit, off with the boots, and I got bored and took this picture. Packed up, hiked down and went off to do honey dos.

Of course the breeze finally showed up after a trip to COSTCO and with frozen food in the truck could not sneak one in, but Reaper and BlubBlub got one.

Tomorrow, Mad Dog is off, hopefully he will share the air.

7 comments:

Mad Dog said...

Great photo Thom! Tomorrows the day, meet you at Kahana after morning golf session...

Alex said...

Thom, I hate to think how many hours you spent up there taking it for the team today. Parawaiting is the evil cousin of paragliding, and we all have to pay those dues sometime, we just rarely talk about it. Don't worry, we'll rehydrate you big time next time we see you.

Anonymous said...

If it wasn't for the Parawaiting god Thom calling Manics perfect after the frozen food delivery, we wouldn't have gotten such a sweet N/W flight over lighthouse with Bonkers and BeckBeck...

Reaper

JeffMc said...

Awesome picture/caption Thom - it was early this morning when I saw it, and thought I was gonna wake the baby I laughed so loud :)

-Jeff

MauiDoug said...

Hilarious Thom! Great photo!

Anonymous said...

He must have been dehydrated to start. His boots are on the wrong feet.

Nightshift

Bon Bon said...

Nice photo, Sidehill.

So.....is this what you did up there for an hour and a half? Did you even check the wind?

You were all out of breath when I called you on the way to the airport. Then I called after we went home, changed, unpacked and got back to MPU and I saw your truck at the Lookout, but you were nowhere to be seen. I called to tell you the wind was nonexistent, but I guess you already knew that.

So....we went to the beach, did some shots, drank some beer, rode some waves on the boogy board, got pummeled by waves, swam out to snorkel near the rocks under Manics... that's when I happened to pop my head up out of the water and look at the windsock. The direction had turned and there was at least some wind blowing!! I told Beck Beck and Jon, "hey, I think it's flyable." with every bit of hope in my tone.

sure enough, after huffing it back to the beach...there's Sidehill at Crazies... waving his arms like a crazed fool, then doing the funky chicken (I think that was his impression of flying a paraglider). It turned on.

We dried off, packed up, and went to Manics. It felt a little strong to me, but doable with help. I launched first. I went straight up. I got around the corner of the first rock and there were two ladies sitting there having a peaceful dinner. One turned her head and her jaw dropped! "OH.. MY... GOD!!!!" I said, "Hiiii!!!" :)

I soared the ridge for about an hour while Reaper and Beck Beck launched. She was stoked. After about 30-45 minutes after they launched, it was shutting down. By now we were just maintaining. We decided it was getting lighter and we should go to the LZ. So, we did... and we made it.

(GoPro video and pictures to follow--guess I should have written my own little story, rather than a comment). ;)

Thanks for the story any how Sidehill....we don't get very many parawaiting stories...even though they happen quite frequently.

~BlubBlub
Malolo