Paragliding Courses P1 and P2

February 9, 2006

I have finished my following courses in last one month.

1. P1 paragliding course with Wings & Flights Paragliding Club. (4 days)
2. Ground Handling with Wings & Flights Paragliding Club. (4 days)
3. P2 paragliding course with Temple Pilots, the paragliding club in our city.

I started my P1 paragliding course with Mr. Eric Mendes (as my Chief Instructor).
For the first day I was given only ground handling. Mr. Mangesh Dighe (the Instructor) taught me how to forward launch, how to take care of the glider and how to fold it.

Second day of my P1 paragliding course was on a small hill (Deer Hill near Pune city, 300ft). This was day with my first solo flight. Wind conditions were very good. My first solo flight was given after a lot (yes, I mean a lot) of instructions. It was completely assisted flight. My takeoff was easy. Instructor was all the time on radio giving me instructions, so flight was also very good. Landing was very bad. It was like crash landing. The reason? As it was my first flight so I was thinking a lot about how to take off and how to fly. In this I totally forgot about what precautions I need to take while landing. So I totally forgot to flare and the wind conditions at the landing area were about nill. Anyways, the overall flight was for 2 minutes.

My third day of my P1 paragliding course was also from the same hill. That day I took two flights. Both were with smooth takeoff and landings. This time I remembered to flare. The flight timings were again around 2 minutes each.

On my fourth day of P1 paragliding course we went to a 1000 ft. hill (named Kanifnath, near Pune city) but we couldn’t fly because of bad wind condition. This long flight is still pending for me. I still have to complete that flight.

That was all for my P1 paragliding course in Pune city of India from Wings & Flights Paragliding Club. It was fun. After this I took the ground handling course for 4 days from the same paragliding school. Than I did my P2 paragliding course from Temple Pilots Paragliding Club. I will write my experience about the next 2 courses in next post. That is all….Bye.