pre-PWC Tucuman: Loma Bola

I write this two days after the competition ended in Tucuman and the comp. is a slight blur at this point. After the comp. Gerald, David and I hopped a ride with some Argentine pilots returning home to the town of Merlo in the province of San Luis. Merlo is a quaint town full of what appear to be the Argentine version of Bed & Breakfasts, and seems to have an economy based on tourism & eco-tourism.


The flying here has great potential but low cloud base and wind has limited the xc (cross-country) flying the past two days. Launch is 1200 meters above the valley and cloudbase is supposed to be 3500 meters but has not risen above 1500 meters. A torrential downpour drenched the area two nights ago and we arrived in the rain. The high humidity has seriously limited the height of cloud-base.


Loma Bola. The flying in Tucuman was challenging to say the least. Every task was individual time, ground start, which means that the field can launch at any time during the launch window and time begins for that pilot when leaving the ground. The first task was a glide fest as there was no lift to be had. Ewa and I tied for 17th place this day. The next 3 tasks were full or nearly fully valid tasks with some pilots making goal each day. A huge shade cycle the final day caused the entire field to sink out. My thoughts linger to that final day where I went out alone over the flats and was still in the air after most of the field sank out. Rather than heading into the shade toward the 3rd turnpoint which was within glide I ventured off-course toward a small sunny patch hoping to catch a thermal. While this may have been good strategy it didn´t work for me or for the Argentine national champion Luis Rosenkjer who came looking for lift in the same spot a few minuets later. We landed about 1km from the 3rd turnpoint and I now question that move as I was high enough to make the turnpoint and then some which would have given me somewhere between 120-150 points more for the day. Overall for the competition I finished 43rd. I am not content with my flying in Tucuman and look forward to more flying and competitions in the future. The results link from the official website has the coolest interactive site I´ve seen that can show individual results of pilots and even compare pilots flights each day. Check it out at: http://lomabola.com.ar/


The photos I´ve posted are for the first time not my own. I´ve copied some images from the comp. site as I need a computer with photoshop or other photo editing software to post my own images and so far have not found one.

Gerald, David and I are now in Merlo where we have entered a XC open distance competition. The farthest flight from the local site, Mirador de los Condores, wins. More stories to come from Merlo and the flying and adventures here.

Tucuman

We arrived in Salta at 9pm after an 11 hour bus ride. First thing Team Iquique did was get bus tickets for a night bus (2am-6am) to Tucuman, checked our wings and went out to dinner. Our first meal in Argentina was fabulous: a huge salad, bread, and of course Argentinian wine and steaks. After starving on the bus all day we were surprised at the amount of food we were able to consume without overeating. Salta´s bus station is clean and hip like one of the nicer airports in the states. We went for a small stroll and then relaxed at a bistro in the Salta bus terminal until it was time to depart for Tucuman.


We arrived with one day to practice before the pre-PWC ( paragliding world cup) began. Cloudbase was 200m over launch and we enjoyed light conditions for a relaxing afternoon flight. There are pilots from all over the world here. Andres and Jose, the Columbian pilots I met in Iquique, are now joined by 15 other Columbian pilots for the second largest representation here after Argentina. Since my arrival in Tucuman I am reunited with my friend David Weider, who along with Todd Wiegand and myself are the only 3 pilots from USA in the comp.

Task one was canceled due to low clouds and many pilots took advantage of the day by going around the mountain range to Valle Tafi which is in the rain shadow. There we found strong desert conditions in this valley reminiscent of Switzerland. Upon landing I made some new friends, three brothers and a sister, who had numerous questions for me and were so excited about the visiting pilots.

Chuquicamata y el Valle de la Luna

Team Iquique formed from new friendships at the Chilean Nationals. We are: Johnny from Switzerland, Richi and Gerald from Austria, Tobias from Sweeden and Todd and myself from USA. We left Iquique en-route to Salta, Argentina for the pre-PWC paragliding competition at Loma Bola, Tucuman, Argentina and found ourselves stuck in Calama with no bus for 2 days. Checking the schedule would have been quite nice.We took advantage of our situation in Calama to visit Chuquicamata, the world´s largest open pit copper mine, located just outside of town.


We took a free tour to the edge of the mine. Notice the trucks in the mine; they appear small but are anything but.

After a night in Calama we took the first bus to San Pedro de Atacama. San Pedro is a touristy hippy town with various activities in the area such as snowboarding sand dunes, visiting national parks, lakes with flamingoes, mountain biking and hiking volcanoes to name a few. We took a tour to el valle de la muerta (the valley of the dead) followed by a visit to el valle de la luna (the valley of the moon).

Gerald took advantage of the wind and a sand dune for a short flight. The park rangers scolded him after he landed for flying within the park. As they say, it´s easier to ask for forgiveness than it is to ask for permission. The following morning we all boarded a bus and began our voyage over the andes to Argentina.