Friday 8th September - The real thing
The sky was clear. It was still blowing Northerly, but the forecast said it would switch to light Southerly by the afternoon. We hiked up Lakora and chose a suitable launch site in readiness. Birds were circling weakly off the lower cliffs in front of the shelf below the refugio, and then the Martins filled the air as a series of early thermals rolled up in front of take-off. We waited until about 2pm for the sun to heat the more South/South West slopes then I launched into a dribble coming up the front. Nothing, then a long glide out over the cliffs. Birds were working things but it was hard, turbulent work and I was gradually sinking out. Almost at the moment when I would have been committed to landing at the bottom of the valley, I caught a better core and started to wok upwards in a cascade of small, gnarly thermals - drifting back towards the refugio, then forwards again. But by 1600 metres I knew I was up, and the climb was gathering pace. Still with vultures always marking the best lift, I kept climbing. Then the first real views of the Pyrenees opened up in front showing the awesome scale of the task we had undertaken. It looked at once fantastic and impossible. I topped out at about 2500 metres, but Simon had been dogged by a breeze over the back shortly after I had launched and was still waiting. Eventually he went, with a "here goes nothing" over the radio. But once over the cliffs he took a strong climb and we were soon thermalling up again together to 2500m.
Now we stuck to our plan although the temptation to drift over with the thermal was great, and headed for a sharp little peak at the valley head to try for a second climb before jumping a gap and on to the east. It was a tough looking task; a long glide, and unlandable terrain behind. It looked like we wouldn't make it, but then one of the sharp bullets of lift coming off the cliff grew sufficiently and Simon hooked it for a strong climb over the jagged pinnacles. I got it less effectively but pushed forward for another and, with Simon's encouragement over the radio persevered to gain enough height for the crossing. This had been a scary moment for me. Quite good air got us across the tree covered bowl to the face of a steep scree slope, then round and over the col, and into the next valley. This moment is unbelievable, all the neurones firing as you round the corner, ready to fight lee side turbulence, and frantically considering options for landing and climbing, and wind direction. It looked quite friendly and we turned in. But immediately the air bit and we both turned out from the spine to avoid the rotor spilling through the gap. This lost us valuable height. I turned back towards the cliffs further up the valley, drifting part with the wind, catching bits for turbulent lift and shouting at myself to keep the wing under control. Simon in the same critical instant turned out to fly over a lower set of cliffs, but was unlucky and came in to land in a small sub-valley. As I climbed I realised just how chancy the outcomes can be. A tiny difference in a snap decision and you are on totally different trajectories (the same was to happen in reverse tomorrow!).
We packed up and walked on up the valley, and at around 6:30 flew again catching lovely evening lift over the West facing cliffs, looking back at our route from the coast under a lowering sun. Then, as it started to set, we made a last buoyant crossing of the deep valley and just nipped through a gap into the next - to a totally new view and easy landing by a small hut. It all looked idyllic, but the hut was tiny and mouse infested, so we walked on for an hour to another. This one was similarly unusable because a shepherd had moved in and chained his dogs to the door. We were forced to camp nearby. Actually it was a beautiful spot and we settled down, exhausted, but content that we were finally doing what we'd come here to do.
Soon after falling asleep I woke to hear a strange growling sound and see a dark shape running across the hill nearby. At first I thought it was a wolf, but soon it showed itself to be a wild boar. In the end our whole night was disturbed by her and her two young digging up the tubers on the grassy slopes around us. In the morning the debris of this digging clearly visible just feet away.
No comments:
Post a Comment