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Well, it’s the run-up to St Hilaire and a busy time of year in the Cross Country office, but we are planning a post-St Hilaire treat: to climb the biggest mountain in Western Europe (4,810m), and fly off it.

A thing of beauty, the big white snow dome at the top of Mont Blanc is visible for miles around, technically not overly difficult to climb and somewhat alluring. Yes, I know there are many, many beautiful peaks to climb, that are less crowded, and litter-strewn than this; and yes, I’ve heard that the scene on leaving the refuge in the darkness of early morning (the middle of the night, most of us would call it) is a continuous train of head-torches; yes, it’s a long way from the peace and solitude of climbing a smaller, less known summit, but somehow it still beckons.

The team are unfortunately very much bound by full calendars, and have only a five-day window to make the attempt, which could be easily thwarted if the weather does not co-operate. It also only gives us time to do a minimal amount of acclimatisation, but if the weather is OK it could just be enough.

In the group will be editor in chief Bob Drury and his partner Sarah; editor Ed Ewing, myself and my neighbour and climbing partner Guy. To add another element to my preparations, Guy does not fly, so I am learning to pilot a tandem wing so that I can take him on the hour’s flight down. Bob will fly tandem with Sarah and Ed will fly solo.

The preparations for the trip are many-fold: We need to decide which route to take, book the appropriate refuge (bearing in mind that we are going out of season, and not all refuges will still be manned); there is kit to gather together and test-fly (can you fit that rope anywhere, and where on earth do you stash an ice axe in flight?). For me, the most difficult and nerve-wracking part of the preparation is learning to fly tandem. Guy is very tall (6’4” or 193 cm), and we will be launching on snow in thin air, just to add to the challenge. And time is getting short …

I started my tandem training with my friend Nicol, a willing volunteer who is a similar size to me, on a lovely docile XL Ozone Mojo. However, Guy is bigger so I needed to move to a tandem wing and a tall passenger. My husband, Marcus, fits the tall bill nicely, and was also willing to be strapped to the front of me. The kind people at Little Cloud came to our rescue with the loan of a lightweight tandem, their new Bidule. At 6.2 kg it’s lighter than some solo wings, and Guy and I will share the load on the climb – one of us carrying the wing whilst the other takes the harnesses and spare clothing.

Nicol and I got onto the Bidule the day after it arrived, with a lovely morning flight at St Andre-les-Alpes. Even in my very inexpert hands, it launches very easily, the wing rising slowly and surely, and easily sitting overhead whilst we get ready for the off. It is beautiful in the air, and thankfully less speedy on landing than I had feared, even in nil wind, and even with Marcus and I on it. I do still need to work on the timing of my landing flare, which needs to take into account someone else’s legs touching down before mine do.

Harness-wise we have a lightweight reversible Woody Valley with split legs, ideal for the purpose, and will raid the Cross Country stores for the smallest, briefest second harness we can find that will be comfortable enough for the hour’s descent flight. Guy is working overseas currently, and not due back until the week before the off, so whilst I will do as much tandem as I can with anyone who’ll let me take them in the meantime, it’ll be a last-minute intense course for him, to take him on his first ever flights and find him a comfortable harness.

For training purposes, I packed myself a separate ‘training kit’ with my Ozone Ultralite 19 in the Woody Valley rucksack to enable me to get used to carrying it up hills, and flying down with it (though solo this time). I included rope, axes and crampons for the exercise and to ensure they will fit in a harness to be flown down again, although they won’t actually have to be carried in a rucksack on the day as they will be in use. Likewise some of the clothing and the helmet will be in use, so the sack will be lighter than I have been training with.

In terms of physical training, I think it’s really endurance that is the key. The ideal is probably to go for regular long walks carrying weight, hence the training kit, though in reality it’s hard to fit too many of these sessions into an already busy life, so I more often go for runs and hope that the aerobic training will be of some help overall. I trained for and ran the Mont Blanc marathon at the end of June and am hoping that some of the stamina gained will still be there, even all this time later.

So then, the itinerary. Firstly, which route? There are two obvious choices if starting from Chamonix: the voie normale, via the Gouter refuge and Bosses ridge, or the Trois Monts route which starts at the Cosmiques refuge and goes over the shoulders of Mt Blanc de Tacul and Mt Maudit.

The former is graded PD (peu difficile) and is really a two-day affair, as it involves several hours’ approach to get to the Gouter refuge (3,817m), and is then a four-and-a-half hour climb on ‘summit day’. The latter is PD+ and is conveniently accessed from the Cosmiques refuge, a half-hour walk from the top of the Aiguille du Midi cable car. It is then around a six or seven-hour walk on summit day.

On further investigation, I discovered the Gouter refuge is likely to be unmanned by mid-September, and the top part of the Mont Blanc Tramway to the Nid d’Aigle, the usual disembarkment point for people heading to the Gouter refuge, is closed for maintenance (you have to get off lower down). The Cosmiques refuge, however, is manned until mid-October and we could happily base ourselves there for a couple of days whilst acclimatising (so saving some uplift fees), so the Trois Monts route seems to be the most sensible choice for us.

In terms of acclimatisation, it is an inexact science and we only have a certain number of days available to us. Generally, it seems to be recommended to spend at least two days and one night at altitude before the night of the summit attempt, although I think the longer you can spend up high, the better.

Our original plan was to climb the Petit Aiguille Vert as one of our acclimatisation routes, with the possibility of flying down from the Grands Montets afterwards (assuming the snow is still in such a condition for this to be possible by the time we have finished the route). However, the Grands Montets cable car shuts on 12 September so this is not possible. So now it makes sense to base ourselves at the Cosmiques refuge for two nights, from where we can do a couple of acclimatisation days before attempting the big one on the third day. These routes will also give us the opportunity to brush up on alpine techniques, using ice axes and crampons and moving roped together.

Other things to think about

Rescue insurance – CAF (Club Alpin Francais) cover para-Alpinism for solo pilots or qualified tandem pilots with non-paying passengers. They also offer reductions on their own refuges’ fees, though the Cosmiques refuge that we will be using is not CAF-owned so this does not apply.

I live in France, so CAF and my French health care card cover all my insurance needs, but if coming from overseas you would need to consider having medical and repatriation insurance too.

Major costs, excluding transport to Chamonix

Aiguille du Midi cable car: €37

Cosmiques Refuge B&B & evening meal, two nights at €49 / night

Kit List

Packing for the mountains can be tricky: while you’ll be exercising and need to not overheat, it will definitely be cold at altitude. A temperature drop of 6 – 7 degrees Celsius every 1,000 m climbed is quoted, so at 5,000 m you can expect the temperature to be 30 – 35 degrees colder than at sea level. And that’s on a good-weather day and without taking wind chill into account. There’s always the possibility of the weather changing for the worse, tiredness or injury (pray not) that could mean you’ll easily get cold.

Conversely, you don’t want to carry more than you have to. I have climbed with people who take cut-off toothbrushes to save weight, so carrying around extra woollies for no reason is definitely not a good idea. So, after some consideration my clothing kit list is as follows:

Base layer – long sleeved wicking top & Ron Hill bottoms
Softshell jacket or fleece
Waterproof jacket and trousers (lots of people use gaiters too)
Loft jacket
Gloves and liners, spare gloves (I actually have dropped a glove over an abyss mid-route before)
Ski socks
Hat (to fit under helmet) or balaclava

Mountain boots suitable for cold weather and crampons
Ice axe
Crampons and anti-ball plates
Helmet, head-torch and batteries
Map, compass, whistle & guidebook
Rope (two between the party of five)
Harness with belay device, two slings, two prussiks, ice screw, spare karabiners
Water bottles (I decided to take actual bottles rather than a plastic drinks hose system in case the tube freezes up)
Tandem, two harnesses and spreaders
Camera
Phone (charged with battery and credit)
Suncream and lip salve

Useful Contacts

Office of Mountain Guides in Chamonix – info on routes, their condition, weather etc

Cable car timetables and prices

Gouter Refuge Tel +33 (0)4 50 54 40 93
Manned June – September.

Cosmiques Refuge Tel +33 (0)4 50 54 40 16
Manned from mid-February to mid-October.

Weather forecast in English  +33 (0)8 92 68 74 20

How do you find the core of a thermal? Bob Drury explains

Once you’ve found a thermal, the next thing to consider is what to do with it. It’s a big subject to try and explain in an article, similar to trying to explain to a toddler how to walk; no matter how good my diagrams and words, you really can’t substitute experience. Lots of flying and lots practice is the only answer.

Like so many aspects of our sport, our human perception of what we should be doing vastly over-complicates the subject of thermalling. All the technology at hand means nothing if you can’t find the strongest part of the thermal!

Almost without exception, all thermals get drifted in either a valley wind or by the true meteo wind, and some might even change direction with altitude as they pass between the two.  Keeping track of which way the thermal is drifting will do two fantastic things to your flying: firstly it will help you stay in the thermal, and secondly it will help find the strongest part of lift within the thermal.

FLY 360S NOT FIGURE OF EIGHTS

When you hit a thermal you should try to establish a 360 pattern as soon as possible. Turning in circles is by far the best way of tracking a thermal, and equally it is also the most efficient way of keeping a glider in a specific piece of air. If you fly a figure-of-eight pattern, you are basically doing gentle wingovers, which are effectively just another good way of losing height.

In comparison, if you can establish the glider in a 360 pattern, usually just the very first 360 turn is inefficient, provided you don’t allow it to drop into a spiral dive. Once the glider has established an angle of bank, the glider will stop trying to dive to regain level flight.

FOUR ELEPHANTS

The first thing you should do when you hit lift that you suspect is a thermal, is to fly out to find deep into it to establish if it is big enough to turn 360s in. To do this, some pilots employ the ’four elephants rule’. Once you hit a thermal you simply fly straight on into it, counting “one elephant, two elephants, three elephants, four!”

If you’re still inside the thermal by the time the fourth elephant comes along, then it’s big enough. Start circling. For myself, I just look back at the hillside until I think I am far enough away to throw in a 360 without hitting the hill.

That first turn is usually the worst as you haven’t established an angle of bank yet, but once you’ve gone around once, the glider will settle down.

Which direction you circle in is much less important than many think unless you are low. If you’re sharing your climb with others then you must circle in the same direction as them.

If you are close to the terrain and there’s a crosswind then circle in the direction that makes the upwind side of your circle the one closest to the hill. That way you’ll be travelling the slowest when you’re the closest to the ground. Competition organisers set compulsory turn directions for this exact reason.

If you are low then you should fly tight and aggressively, as you are more concerned with hanging on to the thermal than anything else. If you feel a substantial difference in the thermal’s strength towards either direction, then turn towards it. However, if you’re free of other aircraft, clear of the terrain and not worried about going down then you should simply turn towards the side that feels most comfortable.

SEARCHING FOR THE CORE

Once you’ve managed to complete three 360’s in a row in constant lift, with the vario beeping all the way around, then you can generally consider the thermal caught and you should start looking for the strongest lift.

To do this, fly towards the upwind side of the thermal by straightening up slightly each time your 360 pattern faces you into the wind.

Once you reach the upwind edge of the thermal, you’ll often feel an increase in lift as you encounter the dynamic assistance of the air blowing up the side of the thermal. But then, if you fly too far, you’ll fall out into the sink.

However, falling out of the upwind side of the thermal is never as bad as falling out of the downwind side. If you do then quickly turn the glider around, and fly back downwind, through the dynamic assistance to the strongest lift.

Falling out of the back of the thermal is much worse. You’ll fall into heavy sink and then have to turn back into wind to fly back slowly, through the sink, into the weakest lift.

LOOK UPWIND FOR THE CORE

There are two reasons why the strongest lift lies at the upwind side of the thermal: firstly, the stronger the lift, the more vertical velocity it has, and the less it is affected by the horizontal wind.

Weak lift is blown to the back of the thermal, leaving the stronger lift at the upwind side. This is why you always see good pilots searching for climbs a long way out front of the hill on windy days.

Secondly, because the thermal has a mass of its own, some of the horizontal wind will actually ride up the front face of it, rather as if it were a hillside, creating lift. It’s for this very reason that gliders can soar up the sides of cumulus clouds, and why pileus caps appear on the tops of cumulus when the wind blows over them.

As you search around in the thermal for the strongest lift, you might feel a strong pull on one side of the glider. If it’s on the inside of the circle you can simply tighten up even further to centre the core, but if it’s on your outside wing, it also often pays to tighten up and quickly bring yourself around 270 degrees so that you can straighten up and fly back to where you felt the stronger lift.

AVOID CHANGING DIRECTION

Personally, I rarely, if ever, change direction in a thermal unless it’s really big. Changing direction in thermals scrambles most pilots’ mental mapping, and it’s also inefficient as discussed earlier when we talked about flying in figure-of-eight patterns.

As the thermal drifts, it’s imperative that you constantly assess which direction is into wind. You can do this by feeling which direction you face when you fly slowest. Remember that this may not be exactly 90 degrees from the slope, as the thermal may be drifting across or even away from it, especially if you are flying in mountains.

When you’re close in to the terrain it’s easy to keep track of this, but as you climb higher it becomes harder to judge. GPS systems that give you your ground speed can help, but it’s more important that you constantly update your picture by staying alert and thinking.

Finally, thermalling is not a science, it’s an art. It’s difficult to describe in words alone, yet I know of several so-called ’rules of thermalling’.

The first is: Turn tighter in strong lift and flatter in weak lift. The first part of this rule aims to keep us in the strongest lift for as long as possible: by turning tightly hopefully we won’t lose the core. This is a technique to help you hold onto a core once you’ve found it.

But, the second part of this rule tells us to widen our circles within the thermal to cover more ground, and increases the chances of bumping into a core. This rule is the rule of choice if we’re either in a strong climb or hunting around within a thermal looking for one.

However, there is a second rule of thermalling that appears to contradict the first. It says: Turn as wide and flat in strong lift as you can and turn as tight as you can if you fall out of it. This second rule appears to contradict the first until we look closer.

By turning as flat and wide as possible we maximise the performance and climb rate of our glider, because ultimately a glider climbs best in a straight line, without any angle of bank. But if we lose the core and fall into weaker lift, we should turn quickly to get back into it – even at the momentary expense of our sink rate. In reality it’s far more important to be climbing in the core, than to suffer a lower sink rate for a few seconds.

Even when you’re established in a thermal, it’s important to keep monitoring where the strongest lift is, by listening to your vario and constantly updating your picture of the thermal. If you ever make two 360’s the same, you’ve let yourself down, because you’ll have taken in no new information.

If you do fly through an area of stronger lift, remember where it was, and on the next time round, flatten out your turn to take you deeper into the area of stronger lift. Fly straight ahead until you pass through the core, then turn tightly again to try and re-centre yourself back in the core. This will help you stay in the strongest lift for as long as possible.

Good pilots always want more from the lift so they explore within the thermal. The really good guys in competitions often don’t turn very tightly. Instead, they appear to wander about the gaggle picking off the best bits of lift. That’s because they stay alert to all the information that the rest of the gliders are giving them. If someone rises slightly faster than them, they fly straight over to them and profit from the other pilot’s core.

Remember it’s not how you fly your glider that counts! It’s where you fly it!

The Himalayan Odyssey paragliding expedition has ended with members of the team having flown 1,100 km of the Indian and Nepalese Himalaya in 48 days.

The expedition, which started in Dharamsala in the western side of the Indian Himalaya with seven members, headed east along the main chain following the now classic route to the Indo/Nepalese border. By the time the expedition reached the border its numbers had dropped to five.

The traverse of Western Nepal, one of the remotest regions of the Himalaya, saw the number reduced to four when Oriol Fernandez landed alone in the Karnali river system and was unable to rejoin the group.

That left Frenchman Antoine Laurens, Austrian Mike Laengle and Americans Eric Reed and Brad Sander to continue on to Pokhara. There, Mike‘s journey ended. Impressively, Antoine, Eric and Brad continued eastward through Nepal to Bhojpur.

The team were unsupported on the ground, other than the cell and sat phones they carried and the SPOTS that tracked them. Lynn Jones tracked the team from Delhi and reported their progress on the web.

The expedition ended after 48 days in Bhojpur in Eastern Nepal when the team hit dangerously turbulent conditions for several days in a row. With the monsoon approaching fast they curtailed their mission, which had been to fly 1,300 km and cross back into India.

Cross Country magazine caught up with the remaining members of the team as they made their way back to civilisation.

XC: Congratulations! What an amazing trip! Having crossed the Indian and Nepalese Himalaya what was the best area to fly through?

AL: In terms of easiness, beauty, regularity and efficiency of the route chosen, with a real ‘bivy spirit’, for me it was clearly India and Uttaranchal.

BS: North India from Dharamsala to the border of Nepal, we killed it. [There were] some concerns with overdevelopment but flying was easy compared to the rest of the route. Stunning mountain views, clear air, tons of HGV’s [Himalayan Griffin Vultures]. I was able to top land all 11 days, so absolutely no need to look for a take off or do any unnecessary hiking! It was the perfect blend of days camping in the mountains and nights in a village, resthouse or other accommodation. The group split and rejoined continually so it was fun to get to spend one-on-one time with people some days and then be in a group the next.

Flying into the Pokhara valley was really emotional for me. This route has been a dream since I started flying here in 2003. For years I never thought it was even possible for me. To do it – and share with my friends here in Pokhara – wow, amazing!

XC: What was the all-time high of the trip?

AL: That every two to three days we were all together again: either meeting in the sky, by bus or jeep or simply walking. We really tried to promote the teamwork, instead of performance and maximum kilometres covered.

ML: The camping was great. Most of the time we landed in places with snow and firewood, made big fires, cooked and slept together, chatting to local shepherds.

BS: Moving forward with my bros, day after day after day! Getting to a geographical place was secondary and never really the goal – throwing ourselves into a huge adventure and just living it was the real high. Being welcomed by the hospitality of locals in so many places. Not making any big mistakes with route finding, maybe not going as fast as we could have alone or in a group of two but doing it as a group. People stopped at different points, but that was their karma… the way it was supposed to go. That everyone is alive and without major injury proves that.

XC: How much time were you alone?

BS: Just the first two days in West Nepal. The first day I took off just before the conditions became unlaunchable and flew alone for 40 km looking for a good top landing. I lost the wing, ended up with riser twists and didn’t have altitude to sort it out. I threw my reserve, missed the cliffs and tall trees, and landed in a soft bush. Got everything out with help of locals and stayed in a small village. I repacked the reserve and made a makeshift envelope and handle. The next day I took off and promptly got trapped by a valley breeze, had a scary top landing and camped out alone. I wasn’t going to fly the third day but a group of 20 vultures called me into the air. I was still stuck in the valley wind, so I dove north into bigger terrain and strong conditions to escape, then rejoined the rest of the group in the air and we flew 30 km together to an awesome high camp where we caught up on our respective adventures. That was just three days’ adventures.

ER: Not very much, but I don’t remember feeling like that was a problem.

ML: We were sometimes in groups of two or three and caught up with the rest the next day. On my last flight before Pokhara I went down and was alone and far from any takeoff possibilities. I had to walk out for two days to reach the road to Pokhara.

XC: What was the scariest moment?

ML: I got smashed in by some bad dust-devil-type rotor in a nasty small bowl-type valley. I crashed into a narrow ridge trying hard to get the wing over my head again. I finally succeeded with 2.5 m of open wing in the middle and big cravats on both sides. I hit a steep terraced field at full speed and somehow didn’t get hurt. Antoine landed to help me. We both took off again and had a hard time escaping – there were no landing possibilities below us. Eventually I made it out of the valley and landed with Brad and Eric. Antoine later got into the same rotor and had to emergency-land in the same place.

AL: Near Dhorpata a front came from behind and the flying conditions got suddenly very strong, with a lot of wind and lift up to 9.5 m/s. Eric, Brad and I were trapped in a valley going up towards a col at 3,000 m, getting smashed and flying backwards. I chose the top of the mountain, thinking it would be safer, but I made a mistake and was happy to not hurt myself, parachuting a good 10 m into a lee-side hill. There was no other option for me.

ER: On our last flying day I got beaten up by some monster turbulence trying to escape a narrow valley with 40+km/h wind blowing down it and not-great landing options. I was way too close to the terrain and super glad when my glider restarted cleanly, but I still had to deal with the landing. I got on the radio between the blow-up and landing and said something to Brad like “really scary down here!” He was dealing with totally different wind 6 or 7 km away.

BS: You might think the reserve toss, but that was calm and peaceful – it happened so fast there was only time to react.

It could have been watching Antoine fly into horrible rotor twice, thinking I was going to watch him hit the ground – if it was anyone else they might have, but he landed safely.

Or it could have been Day 21 that Antoine talks about – that was the most turbulent flying Antoine, Eric or I had ever experienced in our flying careers.

Or Day 42 in East Nepal – strong, windy turbulent conditions. I wanted to land but there was nowhere safe to do so!

However, the scariest for me was Day 46, our last day of flying. Listening to the normally super-calm Eric Reed calling on the radio his coordinates, that he was in bad turbulence and would be landing backwards in a small place. Realising where he was and that I couldn’t land with him, that even landing close to him would be extremely dangerous. Realising that in the end if my friend radioed he was on the ground hurt, or didn’t radio at all, that I couldn’t be there to help him. That was a helpless, horrible, scary feeling.

Read the full story of the adventures that went on during the 48-day Himalayan Odyssey in Cross Country magazine 130, due out in July.

Subscribe here to receive six copies of the world’s only international English-language hang gliding and paragliding magazine.

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The Asian Paragliding Championships in Nishawa, Japan, kicked off on 2 May and has seen some good flying so far. Three tasks have been flown including 49 km, 76 km and 62 km races to goal.

Korea’s Chikyong Ha is currently in pole position onboard a Gin Boomerang, just ahead of team mate Suyong Pi.

Chikyong won the first day, while Gin Seok Song, the boss of Gin Gliders, won Task 2. Korea’s Junghun Park flying an Axis Mercury won Task 3.

Wednesday and Thursday were cancelled because of weather, but more flying is expected as the comp runs until Sunday 9 May.

Ninety-three pilots are taking part, drawn from all across Asia including Japan, Korea, India, indonesia, China and Thailand.

The championships are only the second FAI Asian Championships ever held.

Asian Paragliding Championships

The iPad sold its millionth unit last week and is well on its way to becoming the must-have technology item of the year.

Cross Country magazine is available on the iPad through the Zinio app which lets you access up to 2,000 different magazines.

You can buy single issues or subscribe. Back issues to July 2005 are also available.

Some of the reviews of the Zinio app on the iPad have been good: “I love it. It’s almost perfect. Reading books, comics and magazines is the main reason I bought an iPad. Zinio is great for the latter,” said one.

Others haven’t found it so easy to get to grips with: “Needs lots of work. For now, I’ll stick with paper magazines until this is at least as good an experience as real reading.”

If you own an iPad and read Cross Country magazine on it we’d love to hear what you think. Comment below or let us know at editor@xcmag.com.

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