Paragliding

Aled and Chris are on an adventure in Changwon, being trained to paraglide.

This page follows their adventure, as well as Dave and Jon's, with photos and videos.

Day 1 - Ground Training (Saturday, 22 May)

Ground training on the football field, and paragliders' landing spot, at Changwon Shooting Range.

Here's Chris going through the first part of training: getting to know the lines and where they all go.

Chris kept his cool, despite struggling to comprehend some of what was being said in our trainer's "proficient" English.

The next step was to practice our running take-off, of course, on flat ground with no danger of taking off nor falling down a mountain.

Even so, with a light breeze, some running and pulling of the arms, it was simple to get the canopy airbourne.

Keeping it there and, even more so, keeping on running with the huge drag was not so easy.

We must have ran with it each half a dozen times, maybe a few more.

There aren't so many photos of myself, as I'm the one with the camera! Anyway, here I am!

Day 2 - Asian Paragliding Championships (Sunday, 23 May)

Having done exceptionally well on our first day, we headed to the 1st Asian championships in Hadong.

Unfortunately, strong winds caused the cancellation of the event's final day and so we didn't get to fly.

Day 3 - First Flight (Saturday, 29 May)

Back to Changwon's Shooting Range, where we use a football field as our landing area.

This photo of Chris shows it's not easy getting to the top of the mountain as it's not possible to drive all the way.

It was a hot and humid day and we
were all drenched in our own sweat.

Jon (left) and Dave went through the training some time back and they're experience, encouragement and, mostly, they're English explanations were much appreciated.

Here's Dave ready to go
on the mountain top.

We all made two jumps.

Left: Here's Chris making the second attempt at his second jump.

(I also have video of the aborted take off, but won't show that!)

I aborted my very first take-off, though quite unintentionally.

Jon, here, makes it look easy.

I caught Chris' first landing on camera here.

New video clip! (Added June 3rd)

Many thanks to Bertrand, from France, for allowing me to post this here.

If you can't make it out, here's the audio transcript:

[Gunshots in the background]
Mr Park: "Full brake... full brake... running... running... run run run run run..." [Chris sighs as his backside touches down] "Why no running?!"

Not perfect, but a lot better than mine.

Following the instructions given to me by radio from our teacher on the ground, I was guided to land a few feet short of the football field, right into a bush.

I made sure my second landing was one to be proud of and so it was - like a pro!

The day was all about practicing our take-off and landings, which meant we didn't actually do much flying.

In fact none.

Once off the ground, it was a steady fall back down to ground.

And then we had to pack up the canopy and all.

I'm looking forward to acutally staying in the air and getting some relaxing flight. Maybe next time...