Dallas

Well, I've been around paragliding for a while now (2004) and I have spent a fair amount of time down at Dallas Rd. When I started my training, I thought Dallas flying looked pretty damn dull, but then again; all PGing looks dull to me when I am on the ground. I do seem to spend my share of time on the ground... I think I spend Charlie's share on the ground too.

So a couple weeks back, I had my first Dallas flight. It was on the Sunday of May long weekend and conditions were fantastic.... but after launching and making a couple of passes, I looked down at all those people and thought, how the heck am I not going to hit one of them when I land. Not wanting to fixate on that issue I decided to land right away.

It was easy. Kinda like dodging grannies in a parking lot.

A couple of weeks later, I was getting off work in the early afternoon and things looked promising (I swear I know where every flag in this city is) and I headed down to find a huge beach SW wind and no one there to mentor me.

I kited for quite a while waiting for someone to turn up.... John did and he grumbled about this and that. He also said something about supervision and stuff... which I am all for but..... but WTF... Dallas is on and I'm the only one there!

So I call Jayson. He says a few common sense Dallas things that I have heard before... 'if you hover at the path.... if you can't get to the path... if getting to the path is too easy... etc... etc... if you have a good size beach... go'

I call Pierre, '....hover....too strong.... to light.... big beach.... looks good on the webcam... stuck at work till at least six.... go.'

So I figure, I have a conservative instructor and the French on my side. Maybe I'll go now. If someone gives me a hassle, I'll just blame the Freedom Fries.

So I flew for a little while. I landed on the beach, I found a pretty girl to land next to.

And then came Sunday, June 7th 2009