Blogs from Schwangau, Bavaria, Germany, Europe - page 2

No flying today. Tegelberg was again covered in clouds this morning. It had even snowed quite a bit above 1,000 m SL. So on the mountain, there is quite a winter wonderland . Yesterday, I wrote something about the discussion on sponsorship and FAI/CIVL rules. The topics are discussed on the OzReport, Davis sent me the links. So if you are interested, have a look: sponsorship; sponsorship once more; sprog measurements. Klaus and I walked up Tegelberg once more yesterday. We took another route than last time. First, we walked over to Neuschwanstein Castle, then we took the track up the hill and walked along the high route to the top station of Tegelberg. Shortly after we had left for our tour, it started r... read more

Fog and rain are not as bad as yesterday. Sight is probably 200 metres today. But still, it is raining, you can’t see the top of Tegelberg. So one more day without a task. Yesterday, we walked up to the Drehhütte in a big group, which is about 300 metres below the top of Tegelberg. There were about 20 pilots that did the 1.5 hour walk. Benno had organised a bus for all those who are not fit enough to make it to the restaurant by foot. So we all met in the restaurant and had lunch together, with about 25 people. It was good fun. Afterwards, some caught the bus to ride back to the bottom of the hill, others hiked up to the top of Tegelberg and caught the cable car down. Klaus and ... read more

I woke up this morning and heard the rain. I can see Tegelberg from my bedroom window, and I saw it was covered in clouds. I could not even be bothered to get up early because I already knew that the day would be cancelled. Weather man Volker confirmed that in the team leader briefing at 8:30. And the forecast is not looking good . At least yesterday, I had a great afternoon. As there was a foehn situation, the weather was very nice, sunny and warm. Klaus and I walked up the Gelbe Wand, that is a track that goes up Tegelberg. It is pretty steep, and there are some sections in which you have to climb. There are some chains that you can hold on to. Almost 900 metres of altitude difference. It was ... read more

Yesterday, we had the Opening Ceremony of the World Championships. All the nations proceeded up the road to Tegelberg and went into the marquee that they set up especially for the Worlds. There were some speeches, one of them by organiser Benno Osowski, one by the mayor of Schwangau, one by the local District Administrator, and one by the chairman of German DHV. There were two pastors praying for good Worlds. The children from the local elementary school sang two most lovely songs, one of them in Bavarian. And there were two dancing groups that danced for us, one of them with traditional Bavarian dances. The highlight in my opinion was that hanggliding legend Mike Harker was there, which was a complete surprise to me, and he will be here during the entire comp. For those ... read more

On Monday, the Women’s and Rigids’ Worlds at Tegelberg will start. I will work there as a helper, which is great because it is always a good opportunity to see friends from all over the world. So on Friday morning, I flew from Hamburg to Munich, where Christa from the German Women’s team picked me up. We also took a glider with us. It belongs to Claudia from Colombia, and the airline she had come to Germany with on Thursday had failed to transfer the glider from one plane to the next one in Barcelona, so the glider had not arrived until Friday. So Christa and I picked the glider up in the normal passenger terminal. It was funny to see people stare at these two women carrying a five metres long, 35 kg heavy carpet ... read more