Altfel de zbor

Veselie

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“Flight (paragliding) consist of hours (and days) of complete boredom followed by minutes of total terror or total bliss” said a friend to me and I think it describes very well the subject even if I was not exposed to the terror part.

Yes, I liked the experience very much and I will like to repeat it. No, it will probably not be very soon.

I think there is a lot to say on the topic, from the theory of flight to the actual paragliding flight but I am no expert so you will probably find the same info by searching the net yourself. What it was not so obvious to me is the fact that paragliding has very much in similar with ski or many other sports in the fact that it requires very specific conditions such a place with nice winds and a cable lifter. So in order to start paragliding you need to go to a certain place which in this case is not quite near. Add to this the time required to wait for perfect conditions and you end up with the boredom part. You need a lot, a lot of free time to do paragliding (counting in weeks and months). Not to mention that you also need a lot of time just to learn paragliding. So if you haven’t had a week vacation in a year and time seems more expensive than money then you are surely not the type which can do paragliding.

Not to say that paragliding is a cheap sport. Count the wing, equipment and gadgets which change and gets obsolete very often and you also need a lot of money to do paragliding (in the many tousands of euros range). Of course probably compared to other types of flight, paragliding is one of the cheaper (if not the cheapest) forms.

Time and money aside there is indeed a very nice sensation of bare flight. An open view to the land beneath without cages, metal or motors. Surely something to experience once even for those without time and money. I enjoyed the sensation and the almost 2h of flight justified the 2 days of boredom. I am not sure if the shorter downhill flight would have justified them also so better try the XC flight also if you are not sure what to choose.

Something however was missing in the ecuation for me: the effort. To push, to sweat, to burn in order to achieve something. The lifter and the flight did not included this but if you are climing the mountain by yourself and there is no lifter I can imagine enough effort in that process.

I also liked the people there: nice, friendly, young and free in spirit. A quick browse of the romanian equivalent forums has shown a completely different image (as it happens unfortunately with cycling and many other things here).

One other thing which was not in the picture at first was the rules and regulation part which seems to be quite large also, probably justified but surely not something to think first when seeing (imagining) a paraglider flight.

Paragliding in Sopot, Bulgaria

And nothing about the terror? For me the experience had some bumpy termals and a somewhat acrobatic cone descent but I was expecting much more adrenaline. Instead i’ve found more peace. I cannot say much about the dangers but compared to cycling it’s sure that in cycling you can expect lots of little accidents and pains but in paragliding if there is accident and pain it’s probably rare and final.

So am I going back? Probably, but not very soon, something in the rythm of my live has to change drasticaly in order to get back.

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Paraglider

In the air

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