I had been hoping to paraglide in the Dolomites this autumn, but due to poor weather there hadn’t been any opportunities and I thought the chance was going to escape me this autumn. However thankfully at the start of October there was a brief improvement in the weather, which actually coincided with a good airmass fly XC paragliding. I even already had holiday booked off, as I was on the waitlist for an SIV course, but as 3 days before I still didn’t have a space, I changed my plans and headed to the Dolomites instead.
There was only really one day for good XC flying, the second day was a hike&fly day, so I was a bit disappointed to wake up feeling pretty rough after a bad nights sleep. After a frustrating morning sat at take off waiting for a persistent inversion to lift, I finally had the chance to launch.
Post launch I very nearly bombed straight out down to the valley, but with some fighting got back up to launch and caught a thermal which took me up through the inversion. At this point everything started to get easier, and the air was working as I had hoped it would be.
I stuck with my initial plan and flew up over the Langkofel Gruppe and then down the Val di Fassa, towards the Vajolet Towers and Rosengartenspitze. This was beautiful flying, only slightly marred by being airsick at one point while thermalling, however post that I felt a lot better and was able to properly enjoy the rest of the flight.
I believed when I flew back that I didn’t have enough height to make it back to the Langkofel Gruppe, so headed towards launched and scratched my way back up to take off. But with the high cloud and the late afternoon autumnal sun, there wasn’t enough energy to get back through the inversion. Having looked at other tracks on XContest since the flight, I now know that I could have flown back to the Langkofel Gruppe, and the steep cliffs would have been strong enough to punch me above the inversion. This would have enabled a tour over the Sella Gruppe and over to the Marmalade, but that will have to wait until next time!
After soaring around with the crowds, I decided to head off for a long final glide back to the landing, which was very enjoyable in the floaty evening air before landing back next to the car.
Despite not being one of my longer flights by any stretch of the imagination (28km FAI triangle), it was certainly one of my most memorable, flying amongst the beautiful and dramatic scenery of the dolomites is something very special.
The flight can be viewed on XContest or DHV-XC.
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