Friday

Things turned out much better than expected today and we had a full on race from start to finish... 55k I think it was. As usual, I learned a ton this week and had another tough lesson to get under my belt today. Being in 2nd place going into task 5, I was really not sure how to fly and kind of psyched myself out by thinking I should be careful and hang back a bit. Problem was, that's exactly what happened..... I hung back a bit and let other gliders get ahead of me.... not recognizing the fact that the day was full on racing and that if I'm behind I'll never catch up! Mads Syndergard, prpobably the most experienced comp pilot here, afterwards came up to me and gave me some great advice.... "when your in 2nd place, you should push as hard as you can because your not in first place!" Wow what words or wisdom. Here I was seeking advice from others and the general consensus was to hold back and be a little conservative. I'm so thankful that I had this experience and now have some really good knowledge to go along with a good week of flying. All the top US pilots are here as well as many excellent pilots from around the world. Many pilots were flying stronger and smarter each day so that really made it a challenge for me to keep the edge and stay in the top 3. I've never been in that position before so I guess now I have to make a whole different series of mistakes before I can make it to the podium!

I came in barely in the top 20 today and moved down to 4th place overall. Still a great finish for me if we don't fly tomorrow the last day, which at this point looks very very sketchy looking at the satelite models and forecast, etc....

Already looking forward to the start of the 2010 World Cup Season which will be in Brazil in April. Pics are coming in to goal today at the lake LZ in Valle de Bravo

Thursday

Cloudy.... really weak conditions. No pilots in goal. Long retreive after about a 19 k flight in desperate conditions almost the entire time. When I landed I couldn't even see where the sun was.... Winner only got 240 points I think.... Weather is not looking so good anymore.. Looking really sketchy for Saturday.... maybe even some rain. Definately not the typical Valle de Bravo weather. If we don't race tomorrow or Saturday, it would be the first no fly day in the 7 comps I've flown here over the past several years!

Watched a mid air today happen in the same really weak thermal I was in but several hundred feet below me. Both pilots and gliders were immediately all tangled up but both were able to throw their reserves right away and had soft landings with only a very minor scratch or two.... One of the midair pilots was our very only BZ from Sitka.

I think school was let out early today when I landed in a field near by in a very small and very rural village. All the school kids practiced there english with me. I think I answered the "whats your name" and "where are you from" question about a hundred times, and heard all kinds of various english words being offered up to me... They were really nice kids who probably don't get paragliders landing in their area too often. The first one to greet me when I landed wasn't what I expected. I didn't notice any animals in the field I'd chosen to land in. There was one animal, however, that usually has a entire field for himself. Mr. El Torro gave me a rather personal greeting.... walking right up to me and my glider and then casually sniffing my glider and then just stood there and we kind of had a standoff for a few minutes... About that time the kids all came running across the field and promptly sent the bull on his way...

It was really optimistic of the task committee sending us out across the lower terrain in these conditions. I think we were all hoping for a bit more sun energy to make it's way through so we could get around the course - even if very slowly...

Hoping the XC skies forecast is wrong for tomorrow and we get to fly...

Pics are of launch, task breifing, previous day top 3 finishers, view from our bedroom at our Casa del Lego in Valle, and my friend today at landing....

Wednesday

Finishing up yesterdays race.... After making it all the way back to the front with the leaders, I hooked up with Ronny Helgesen, a very good pilot from Norway who runs tours in Valle de Bravo in the winter. We put our selves in excellent position to make a run for the win but didn't take the climb high enough over the Crazy Thermal Mesa and got stuck on the next glide. It was tough spending so much time groveling around trying to get re-established in the lift and watching the pilots who would eventually win the day fly over our heads 10 minutes later... I tied for 4th place so was quite happy to have come from so far behind to have a good finish.

Today was a classic Valle de Bravo race day with great clouds and light winds. Sue decided to fly from the Penon launch so I spent the earlier part of the morning with her. She had a beautiful launch and flight and I took lots of pictures. She doesn't fly all that often so I really enjoyed watching her thermal to cloud base with some birds and enjoy her time in the air. The conditions couldn't have been more perfect.

The task committee called a 71k race to goal with a different route than we usually fly. It made the decision making quite a challenge in deciding which would be the best route to take through the course. The clouds were great and it was full on great racing for most of the race. There was one very difficult section where we had to fly into a strong headwind which is always a real challenge on a paraglider. I had the perfect start but somehow managed to find myself behind early in the race. Many pilots are pushing very hard going for a big point score so you really have to evaluate each pilots decision making as well as your own. I worked hard and played catch up for the entire flight. I caught the lead gaggle just before the last turnpoint and got a climb to cloud base quicker than all but the two leaders. I had to head out on final glide under an enormous black cloud. I was somewhat worried about getting caught in cloud suck but it turned out that it was so shadowed that the the cloud wasn't really cycling anymore so it worked out just fine. It was a 14 kilometer glide from the last turn point to the goal at Valle. The two front runners left a few turns before me so I didn't stand much chance of catching them as they are both quite fast. I climbed a little higher than I usually would because the final glide is over the lake and you sure don't want to end up short!! I did manage third into goal which was a great finish for me....

Really a fun day with classic Valle conditions. There were a couple of reserve rides yesterday, and one today that I know of.... No injuries that I'm aware of other than some bumps and bruises. Looks like some high clouds will be moving into the region for the next few days so that may have an impact on the flying.... we'll see....

We've been enjoying nice meals and overall been having a really nice time here in Valle de Bravo.... Pics are of Sue tearing up the skies today at the El Pinon...

Day two was a blast with difficult conditions followed by racing under the convergence. I just KILLED the start and was the highest glider in the sky and then I proceeded to somehow become one of the lowest gliders in the air watching a giant gaggle of at least 100 gliders all going on glide together towards the next turnpoint while I was left to cross some really unfriendly looking terrain much lower than Ii would have liked. Got WAY behind at that point, and by the time I got established again the lead gaggle were just specks on the horizon. OK, time to just make my way to goal and get what ever points I can..... Enjoy the beautiful flight and work on my thermaling techniques. As I pushed on, things started to turn on for me and I found myself catching more and more gliders. I flew a good line and got a great climb to the base of the first forming cloud I'd seen since I've been here and then headed out on glide back towards the launch area and the El Pinon. As I was settling into my glide I looked down and a couple of thousand feet below me I see Brad, our current top US pilot, struggling way down low with the lead gaggle! A few other gliders below me and to my left, and Jeff, another US pilot pushing out in front of me but lower. GAME ON! The leaders had all slowed way down prior to the last turnpoint when I was making good time and I had caught up.....
more to follow... Sue is going to fly today before the start window and todays race so we are heading out early this morning....

Pics are of Sue flying from La Torre and of day one race day....

Monarca day 1

The 2010 Monarca is off and running with a nice 71k race to goal. Sue rolled in to Valle on Monday, and I finally made my way from Colombia on Wednesday. We've had several nice days together hiking and just hanging out relaxing. The conditions here have been high pressure with no clouds and bullet thermals so I only did one warm up flight and then Sue and I both did an evening soaring flight from La Torre, which is the soaring site just above Valle de Bravo.

The first day was quite fast with good racing conditions most of the way around the course. The day was high pressure with no clouds but was all in all a pretty good race day with 32 pilots in goal. I flew quite well right up until the end when I made just an ever so slight turn towards the Pinon looking for a thermal, as the other 4 pilots in the lead gaggle kept pressing on the course line. Before I knew it, they were climbing and I was sinking. I immediately jumped on the speed bar and tried to catch up with them... I did catch them, but I was a good 100 feet lower, and when we found the next climb, I struggled with it while watching the 4 of them get it quickly and climb out. From that point it was full on racing for them and I was never able to catch up again. One of their group took a bad line towards the final turnpoint and landed on the Mesa. I came in about 8 or 9 minutes behind the 3 leaders in 4th place so was a good day of flying for me with one costly mental lapse at the end...

Winds are light and the weather forecast is looking really good for the rest of the week. Might even see some clouds tomorrow......

There are about 145 pilots competing so the start gaggles are pretty crazy. There are a few very inexperienced pilots so you really have to watch out when thermaling as occasionally pilots are doing things which can really take you by surprise if you're not ready....

results are here... http://www.monarcaparaglidingopen.com/

Friday Saturday

Not much chance to post in the last two days! On Friday they organizers went big and sent us on a 120k race to goal. By the time I made it back from goal my back was pretty whacked out so I opted for a 1 hour full body massage instead of time on the computer! It was a bit painful but quite effective and that really helped me get through the next few days. Yesterday, Saturday, the weather was again beautiful and we finished the week with a 71k race around the valley with goal back in Roldanillo. I made up my mind early that I was going to make my own way and avoid flying in the valley any earlier than necessary. As a result of this decision, I ended up by myself for the first third of the race or so. When I did have to cross the valley I got really low and just headed for the biggest, darkest farm field I could find. I was almost all the way across this field, and getting very low, about 50 meters, when I spied a couple of vultures just taking off from a tree near the farm house where I was preparing to land and sure enough they had taken off right into a nice thermal which was just releasing from the field... At this point the lead gaggle had spied my thermal find and was racing to catch me. Another large gaggle had taken a completely different route and was also joining us from a different direction. It was very fast racing from that point until the last 7 or 8 k when things just screeched to a stop in very light valley conditions. I had been in the lead with Dennis Kortel for the past hour and we both ended up stuck on a small ridge. I decided to make a 90 degree turn off course and head into the higher terrain and make my way to the goal that way. I almost won the day but instead took second as another pilot had come from behind and gotten a huge climb much higher than others at the last turn point and had just glided all the way down the valley to goal...

All in all one of the best weeks of flying I've ever had. Beautiful country, super friendly people, and some of the best, most consistent flying I've ever enjoyed.

I'm packing now for my trip to Mexico city and then to Valle de Bravo. There's no easy way to get there from here so it will take probably 3 days to get there. I'm quite tired so I'm going to take it just one day at a time.. Today I head to Cali Colombia, and then I'm hoping to catch an American flight from Cali to Miami... spend the night and then catch an American flight to Mexico City.... Will post again from Valle de Bravo. The Monarca competition starts on the 23rd I think...

Pics are of an enterprising farmer getting so good use out of his horse!
There was a small army of police hired on to make a show of protecting us during the competition. Apparently there has been some history here in past years of kidnapping which as caused some of the strong world cup countries to boycott flying competitions in Colombia.. supposedly this isn't an issue any more...
Some artwork I had done in Honolulu before christmas this year...

Jack

Big Scary Dog in the park
Lots of police with big guns around this place
gliding into goal on Wednesday

Thursday

Whoo what a day. This place rocks - that's all there is to it.. An 80k race to goal today which ended with strong winds at goal and several pilots questioning the call by the task committee. The local pilots felt sure that the winds which come every afternoon wouldn't come until an hour later than they did. Boy, if you can predict the winds that closely in a place like this you are one heck of a forecaster and should do it for a living!!

I went on final glide with a 5 to 1 ratio and I still didn't make it and got absolutely drilled in the process, watching a couple of others just in front of me, but lower get pummeled in the strong winds. I did make the end of speed section so I'll only lose 20% of my speed points which shouldn't hurt to bad. I got to practice landing going backwards so that was good and ended up really well. I just grabbed the A risers on one side, and the trailing edge of the other and yanked them both as I was touching the ground and the glider was instantly disabled and didn't even try to re-inflate in the 25-30mph winds. A couple of others wern't so lucky and tried to get a few more meters out of their glide and landed in some big sugar cane fields. I was kind of disappointed that I didn't make the actual 200 meter goal cylinder because when I was 5 or 6 kilometers out from goal I was flying through some monster lift and not turning because I was sure I was going to make it no problem!! It's amazing considering how many turns I did today thermaling around the course... I only needed a couple more and I would have made it! The battery on my radio had died earlier and they were warning people on the radio to get extra altitude before trying to make the goal.... OH WELL!

Ended up in 6th place yesterday on the 100k race and I finally broke down and looked at the results today. I'm all the way back to 23rd - YOO HOOO!! That means after todays finish I'll be back into preferred launching status - life is good! Unfortunately, I couldn't help but run the scenario of just making goal in the middle of the pack on the second day instead of bombing out..... that's right, I'd be in first place by over 200 points!! Can we just do a little rewind please? Dennis Kortel is just killing it making great decisions each and every day.

This has been some of the best, if not the best training session I've ever had for XC racing... Got off to a rough start in terms of organization but has really improved since the onsite pwc observer took over the position of organizer...

My back took a real beating yesterday on that 3 hour retrieve sitting on a straight back bench seat. I've been spending time on the hard floor and doing lots of stretching to keep myself functional. I may go see if I can find someone to give me a massage here in a bit. I always get stronger at these things but the process is painful sometime until I get over the hump...I think the last few days here I'll let one of the kids earn some $ by hauling my glider up to launch for me... Either that or there is a guy with horse who is hauling up gliders... It's only 10 minutes or so but it's alot of uphill. Was nice today landing close to Roldanillo, even if I did land going backwards...

Weather is looking great for the next few days.... Looking forward to getting to Valle de Bravo and hooking up with Sue and just hanging out for a few days!

Jack

Wednesday

Great workout today. 100k race with pretty good racing conditions for the first half and then things slowed down as we worked our way down the valley. I had a "very unprofessional" launch as the technical director put it... Because of my bomb out yesterday, I lost my preferred launching status, which is something I've not been without for awhile. I never got it at a world cup comp because they just do an ordered launch from #1 all the way down the list, but I'm pretty spoiled with it everywhere else. So, I had to get ready early, and I was going to be one of the first to launch when they decided to move the start time back a half an hour. This extra half hour was all the time it took for another 100 pilots to get ready so my window to launch early was closing in a hurry. Yesterday there were 15 pilots who were not able to launch because the wind started blowing from over the back. There wasn't enough wind to do a reverse launch so I had to do a forward, and other pilots were laying their gliders out below me on the hill so it was 'now or never'. Unfortunately the "now" part of the equation didn't include any wind at all to help me so I just went charging down the hill, jumping over not one, nor two, but three other gliders as I valiantly guided my wing this way and that way finally getting airborne at the bottom of the launch area. It was just plane UGLY! I didn't do any damage to anyone's glider but that was clearly the ugliest launch I've had in quite awhile. I thought about trying to abort but that probably would have been worse than just getting it overwith and getting air borne. This rocket ship I'm flying needs alot of speed to get airborne!

I finished today maybe 7th or 8th or so and am pretty happy with how I flew. There were maybe 25 out of 145 pilots in goal. Took almost 3 hours to get back to Roldanillo with one stop for some refreshmeents. They had two busses at goal to take us back - one pretty nice one with nice seats, and another worn out one with bench seats. For some reason they put our gliders in the nice cumffy seats and made us ride in the old bus with very uncomfortable seating... Weather looks even better tomorrow so should be another great race day.

If you're reading this Mom or someone is reading it to you HAPPY BIRTHDAY I LOVE YOU!

Jack

Tuesday

Tuesday

Well I was #1 for a whole day!! Today the conditions seemed much stronger and after getting a great start and pushing out with the leaders I got too agressive and dirted before the first turn point. Landed pretty far out in a rural area and had a very enjoyable 2 hours visiting with the local kids (and adults) while waiting for the retreive to find me and bring me back to Roldanillo. A puppy found me and we quickly became close friends. There was one 12 or 13 year old boy who had spent 6 months in New York going to school and learning english so he was asking me questions and translating to the large gathering of locals who had come to see the tall gringo who had dropped out of the sky in their small village...

I was majorly upset today at my decision making right after I landed.. it was way too early to push out in front over questionable terrain so early in the race. I'm flying very well and am plenty fast enough to keep up with the top pilots so it was just plain stupid what I did today. Winning yesterday gave me very large point spread lead from the closest pilots so in theory I could have just kicked back and flown conservatively the rest of the week and I would have had a good shot at winning the comp. Being a "pimp" though isn't going to help me learn how to win so that really wasn't an option for me. I had a great start today, flew really well for awhile staying out front with the leaders so it's all good! The weather's looking really good and tomorrow's another day so I get to reset and have a go of it again. I've nothing to lose now with the scoring so I'll probably just go all out and fly as fast and far as possible....it would be great if I could win another task!

Jack

There are police with machine guns EVERYWHERE here but they are quite friendly!
Kids at the place where I landed today
My "mule" who carried my glider for 75 cents...
Pilot briefing today up on launch..

Monday

Today was a good day for me as I finally won a FAI Cat2 race day. Lots of decision making combined with plenty of patience paid off. It was a difficult day with good racing conditions to start but then high clouds moved in and really slowed things down. I had plenty of excellent pilots fly right be me while I patiently worked light lift to stay alive until the sun broke through again. I didn't quite make it to goal, but was only a couple of kilometers short. The next closest pilot was 9 kilometers out. Don't know what the point spread will be with no pilots in goal but should be a great start for me either way....

The organization is getting much better - primarily because the technical director is now the meet organizer. The original organizer is now just flying the comp instead of running it.

Weather looks better tomorrow and is supposedly gonna be better each day so should be a good week of flying. Looking forward to hooking up with Sue in Valle de Bravo next week!

Pics are the competition launch in the mountains behind Roldanillo
A bird that was hanging out by the swimming pool
A large butterfly (about 6 inches across )
Weather on the first day where we all went up the hill and got rained on...
The street and park right outside my hotel....

Sunday

After a mostly relaxing day yesterday, today began with much confusion, which seems to be the norm so far... yesterday I packed up my stuff in the am thinking that I was going to be moving to this nice place the organizers had set up for myself, the pwc observer, Niki the technical director from England, and one other. I left my things in a friends room where they remained all day. I finally gave up around 10pm on the idea that I was actually going to make it to this other accomodation and rechecked back into the same hotel assuring them that I would only be there for one more night. Of course, everything had changed during the course of the night. The organizer (Lucho) had planned this comp around a new launch that they've developed which is about a 45 minute drive up into the mountains behind Roldanillo. All the logistics were planned around that location.... lodging, retreival, etc... when the Technical director and PWC observer got onsite and observed the new launch in action, they informed the organizer, in very plain terms, that there was no way that they would ever see a PWC event at that location. So now we are back to the traditional launch, which is accessed from a completely different direction from Roldanillo. Seeing as how most of the pilots were staying on this large farm up by the new launch, this would involve almost 1:45 min of driving in the am just to get to launch, not to mention driving back up the mountain for scoring, etc... It became obvious in a hurry that this wasn't going to work....

On top of everything else we woke to solid overcast and dismal looking conditions.
Apparently Niki and Leonardo, the pwc official observer on site, made their way on their own yesterday up the mountain and found this other farm house where the 4 of us were to be staying.... I guess their were some issues with the owner or other problems which are making this place not an option anymore - don't really know any particulars because I wasn't able to talk with Niki today do to the fact that, get this, she and Leonardo were apparently "forgoten about" today and not picked up and included in the days activities. Today's activities included early morning chaos highlighted by gps uploads by the scorekeeper accomplished in his underware. Next was the amazing race to get everyone and their gliders loaded into any one of a number of vehicles for the mad dash up to the traditional launch site. I'm looking at the wx conditions thinking "hmmm, it looks like it would take at least 4 hours for any possibility of anything happening in terms of flying". I'm doing this while racing to go back to my hotel room and get my glider, of course giving up any option to address 'pressing' physiological concerns, brush my teeth, etc...

So, standing room only in a bus which is a "20 minute" drive to launch. 45 minutes later we arrive at the end of the paved road, several thousand feet up into the mountains to the north of Roldanillo. It has been raining in the area and looks to be getting ready to rain more.. Another "hmmm, and why didn't the organizer just send someone up the mountain earlier to assess the conditions?" Now everyone is unloaded and having coffee and snacks at the small store nearby. My glider is on the top of a load of wings in a dump truck which is uncovered sitting nearby. I won the first race of the day by being the first one to get my glider off the truck and undercover before the downpour started. There is plenty of shelter here and I spend the next hour visiting and enjoying conversation with various pilots from different places... Really friendly people and I really want to fly as my flight on Friday was quite enjoyable and my wing with it's new lines is really hungry to fly as well.

After an hour or so socializing, the weather began to 'cycle' and clear up somewhat, and soon a loud voice boomed something in espanol which apparantely meant that we were going to launch "just up the hill". I couldn't help but another "hmmm... as wet as the ground now is, as soon as the sun comes out, the whole area is going to just explode with more clouds and rain". Not to worry, we always get to fly here even when it rains in the morning" Ok, fine.... 30 minutes later driving on pretty good gravel roads it's beginning to rain lightly. We have to walk the last stretch about 10 min and then the launch is up on a hillside above the road. Now I'm seeing why they really can't wait around too much in Roldanillo because it's pretty time consuming and a logistical challeng getting 150 pilots and their wings up to this launch in time to set up, call a task, and have a race...

So now here we all are up at launch, in the clouds, and the rain is starting again. There were many Jeeps and other private vehicles that had driven all the way to launch so here I didn't win the next race but was clearly in the top ten finishers finding a way with my glider into the covered back of one of the jeeps... Many pilots had collected their wings and walked up to the actual hillside launch area and were now officially getting wet.... In the back of this Jeep I remained for the next hour while it continued to rain and then finally began to cycle again and look promising.... this is when they officially "called the day" and the trek back down the mountain began. The reason they called the day even though things were starting to look promising was because there is a local phenomena in this region of Colombia where the strong sea breezes from the Pacific ocean move inland to this area and it blows over the back strongly every early afternoon. When we race here we fly away from this area after starting the race and go across the valley where the sea winds don't happen. Anyway, I held strong to my dry position and wasn't gonna give it up for anything. This proved to be a good move as I was one of the first to get back down to Roldanillo. I couldn't even see out of the back of the Jeep as there were so many pilots just standing on the bumper and hanging on to anything all the way back to Roldanillo.

My new Colombian friend, Sebastian, is a pilot for "Flex Jets" which is a huge corporate jet charter company, got into Roldanillo last night. He has been running some language barrier interference for me and has been very helpful since he arrived. He had been talking with the organizer and this morning kind of brought me up to date on what was going on. The first thing he says is "don't give up your hotel room" because we are going to be using the traditional launch. I'm thinking I've already checked in and out of my hotel twice, and switched rooms, etc... generally been a pain in the butt for the hotel. Sebastian went over and get me set up for the rest of the week no problemo. I'm happy cuz my room is in a quiet part of the hotel, and I have hot water. No AC but there is a nice fan and it's plenty comfortable.

Today when I got back to my room I luxuriated with a nice long nap and then headed back to the pool club where they are just finishing up a major birthday bash for a 6 year old. It's been total mayhem and now I'm relishing the quiet. This place is nice and the wireless internet is good. I've not spoken with Lucho about staying anywhere else... he's never even approached me to talk about anything. There's no way I'm leaving my hotel room at this point.... It's perfectly located right in the heart of things here in Roldanillo.

Even though I was very careful with my expectations about the organization here, I'm a bit disappointed in things thus far. It turns out that last night they had a big opening ceremony up at the "old headquarters" farm with the Mayor of Roldanillo in attendance, etc... None of the pilots staying in Roldanillo even knew this was happening, including myself. I was up there at 5 pm registering and talking to Lucho and there was no mention, posting, word of mouth or nothing to let us know about the evenings activities. I do enjoy these things and this is part of the reason I torture myself with such long travel sessions to far away places...

This is a very interesting place and the culture seems traditional and very catholic. The central square or "park" is just full of people now who I think travel into the "big city" from the countryside on Sundays to visit and attend church, etc... Mothers and daughters or two friends always walk physically touching one another - a hand in hand or a hand on a shoulder. When I walk through the park there are many eyes on me - a tall gringo who is obviously from some place far away... The term "mutt" takes on a whole new meaning here. The original pure breed dog that started the line of some of the dogs around this place probably is a hundred years old!! You can't even begin to guess what the original line might have been.

I've started to do my own weather forecast looking at my XC Skies subscription and tomorow looks iffy but could happen with light conditions. The days after look even better. It hasn't rained here in literally months so hopefully things arn't changing...I'll try and get some pics posted soon..
Need to race..
Jack

Hola Colombia Thursday Jan 7th

Anchorage - Louisville KY - Miami FL - Bogota Colombia - Pereria Colombia - Roldanillo Colombia. The trip started great with a bunk on a UPS 747-400 freighter from Anchorage. Made it to Miami in less than 12 hours so that was pretty good. American was very accomodating and put me in Biz class for the flight from Miami to Bogata. I had a ZED standby ticket on Avianca Airlines from Bogota to Pereria which also went very smoothly.

The challenge began when I stepped outside the aeropuerto in Pereria for the taxi ride to Roldanillo. Fortunately a local women stepped in on my behalf to help me make sure I got into a taxi with a driver who was actually liscensed, and that I didn't get completely ripped off. This seem to get worked out ok and off I went with a driver who seemed rather excited to be taking me to Roldanillo. Turns out it wasn't legal for him to work outside of Pereria so he, to my dismay, took me all the way across Pereria to the east side of the city (the opposite direction from where I was going) to go to the main taxi office to get special authorization to take me out of the city to Roldanillo. I had to sign papers and show my passport, etc., just to let the guy drive me to Roldanillo. An hour and a half after I originally left the airport with this taxi, we are driving right back by the airport again finally leaving the city headed out... We found Roldanillo after only one wrong turn and overall it was a nice ride once we finally got going. That turned out to be the most expensive part of my journey...

Got situated in a pretty descent hotel right on the main square of Roldanillo. Had to switch rooms as they had me in a very noisy room where even with ear plugs I wasn't going to be able to rest well. On friday I made my way up to launch with about 50-60 other pilots who were arriving a couple of days early for the competition. Had a wonderful flight of abotu 70 kilometers in pretty easy conditions. Landed with one of the top Colombian pilots at a small airport across the valley. Was very happy with my glider flying with the new line set I had just installed. The trim and feel was very noticiably improved so this was a very good thing. If conditions stay like this it will be full on racing and should be a blast. The terrain is friendly, the people seem quite friendly so has the potential to be a great comp... will see!!!
Tomorrow I will probably just rest and take it easy...
Jack