A weekend with sunny weather. Good to be on the beach. Unfortunately, it was not very good to fly. Wind conditions were strong and continuous gusts of over 20 mph + were recorded along the entire north coast. Saturday was our official weekend activity. We meet at Parque del Norte de Hatillo from 9 AM onward. Later, on Sunday, some of us went to Villa Pesquera de Isabela from 8:00 onward. Before continuing with the stories, we will pass list of the “Kamikazes” pilots present with their respective families.
Present:
Luis Ruiz
Pablo Cruz and his wife Millie
Ricardo González and his wife Ermelinda
Gregory Santiago and daughter Keyra Lis
Omar Román
Robert Rodríguez
Felito Rodríguez
Roberto González
Ted Sowinski
Lucas Fontanes and family
We started on Saturday, at Parque del Norte in Hatillo. Windy conditions started from early in the morning. Pablo and Omar took the opportunity to fly early. While Ricardo, Gregory, Robert Rodriguez and Robert Gonzalez arrived but faced with the intensity of winds, preferred not to fly.
Luis Ruiz, on the other hand, concentrated on the classes of the students, Ted Sowinski, and later Felito Rodríguez, who officially began his course today. Given the strong wind, they preferred to go practice on the grass at the track. Ted was practicing hard the inflation and Felito began with his theoretical course. We took advantage, to show the students how to change a damage line from a paraglider.
At 10 AM, arrived Lucas Fontanes and his family from Trujillo Alto. Lucas is looking forward to live his experience of the paramotor. But due to the hard weather conditions it was decided to postpone it for tomorrow morning in Isabela.
Later in the day, Luis took out a mini paraglider of 2.5 meters and began to play with it and invited the students and pilots to try it. The sensation of reaction on the mini was very similar to the traditional paragliders. Obviously at a smaller scale. Ted, Felito, Ricardo, Pablo and Gregory proved it. All very pleased with the toy. To finish the activity, Luis went flying with his fast paraglider Apco NRG PRO 18.5, and was kind of comfortable on his flight. But being alone flying is not very entertaining. So, we decided to finish the activity early, in order to go tomorrow early in the morning to Isabela.
Sunday arrived and Luis, as announced, was very early in Villa Pesquera Isabela. Again the wind conditions became strong, but we bet that we could do the flight of Lucas. While we were waiting for Lucas and his family, Ted and Felito were arriving, as well as the pilots Robert González and Omar Román.
The practices of Ted are improving considerably, and today he kept the glider on Top on himself, and he looked very comfortable doing it. Felito on the other hand, began today his first inflation practice of the paraglider. He did it quite well. Three (3) paragliders were tested for Felito. He could observe the different reactions of each one of them. Finally Lucas and his family arrived at around 9:30 AM. The flight was complicated because the wind gusts were measured at over 20 mph …
The gears were ready and we decided to try it. Ted and Felito were giving assistance to Luis. As expected, Luis launched with Lucas with no major problems and kept flying around. The flight did not last as long as expected since there was an unforeseen problem with the paramotor belt of the propeller pulley and it had to land early. The landing was a very smooth and Lucas was happy. We already coordinate to do it again in better weather conditions. While this was happening, on the other hand Robert and Omar went flying. It was outstanding their takeoff in strong conditions. They went all the way flying to Jobos Beach. Their return was delayed due the intensity of winds, but both pilots were happy.
Robert has to return next week to Africa where he does professional work, So he was very happy to be able to fly before leaving the island. At midday we finished the activity. As always, we thank God for these opportunities that allow us to live.
