Summer 2011

Ben, under power, flying towards Hayling Island

The Summer started off well with some glorious Easter sunshine. The field in front of our cottage was empty until they planted maize in it which sadly meant we could no longer use it as a take off field. We flew from other stubble fields and used a field near the coast near the village of Hambrook. The maize has recently been harvested which makes it possible for us to use for flying again! Here are some flying shots taken recently... Michel Carnet - Reigning World Champion

Michel Carnet - aboard his Nucleon Wing

Mark Morgan - local boy

Ben Clowes - flying low near Selsey / Witterings

Ben Clowes on Cloud 9

Ben Clowes flying over the groynes

Ben Clowes over Chichester Habour

Sunset flying in October flying over Wittering Beach - packed with people!

Somebody's private airstrip! Nice!

Spinaker Tower - Portsmouth (Sunset)

Our usual take-off field in front of the cottage... The maize has been freshly cut...

Venezuelan Paramotor Adventure

Earlier this year in January, 2010, our friends / sponsors at Hewlett Packard sent us into the depths of Venezuela to test out their latest LTO tape drive. The marketing campaign has just been launched and you can see some of the things we got up to here in this short video. The quality is not great but it will give you an idea of the amazing flying we did up on the Gran Sabana. Michel Carnet (the Paramotor World Champion) came with us and it was WILD!

Flying the coast (Weymouth)

On Friday 25th June, I took off from Pulborough, from my friend Seymore's farm, at 9am. I had chosen to fly the Bailey 175 for fuel economy and I thought that I might just make it to a field near Weymouth on 14ltrs (160kms away). There was a 'Fly-in' that had been organised by Ben de Candole and there were going to be many pilots there. After 140kms I landed to refuel at Winterbourne Kingston (only 22kms away from Weymouth). I managed to hitch a ride from a friendly lady (whom I met in Scats, the farm shop!) to get some fuel in Bere Regis and got back to find the exhaust bracket had snapped! So that was it for me, or so I thought! My lovely wife, Diana, picked me up and I drove like a demon back to Sussex to pick up my other machine (a TOP 80 miniplane). The weather was set to be perfect and I wanted to experience the coast.

Here are some photos I took the following day - you will see that the sea mist rolled in but this added to the atmosphere...

Flying the entire length of Chesil Beach only a couple of metres from the ground was a highlight for me. Waving at the fishermen and the children. Everyone was smiling! What a day!
We landed on the beach at the Abbotsbury end and had a beer! We thought about a swim but we were wondering how we were going to take off again as the pebbles were very hard to run on. We carried our gear to the nearby field and took off from there. Sadly our host, Ben de Candole, had problems with his motor so had to be retrieved later and he got back to the field when it was dark. (from l to r) Colin, Ben, Phil, Paul...







Paragliders flying the White Horse in Weymouth - the wind was light and not much flying was had for them!
Evan flying back towards the field from the coast. You can see where the exhaust bracket snapped on my machine which was the reason I was unable to take off again to finish the final leg of the journey to the field near Weymouth!

80,000 feet above Earth!

Near Space Balloon Flight, shot with HD HERO cameras from GoPro from Kevin Macko on Vimeo.

I saw this and it blew me away! Check it out!

Flying in the Lost World

If you do not already subscribe to PARAMOTOR MAG then perhaps now is the time to. Issue 18 will include our story of flying in the Lost World and it comes out next week! You can see a handful of photos in the Photo Gallery on the right hand side
(click on Venezuela)...

Enjoy!

Danny MacAskill

Quite the most astounding clip I have ever seen... Enjoy...

Venezuelan Gran Sabana

We are currently in the Gran Sabana in Venezuela. A wilderness of savanah flatlands and magical Tepuis rising high out of dense jungle. Michel Carnet, Ben and I are flying paramotors and it is wild - like something out of a glossy magasine! Yesterday, we flew 30km over dense jungle and past a small tepui called Chiri Cayen before landing in an indian settlement where the locals looked bewildered when we landed on their football pitch. It was a surreal experience! We carry SPOT gps positioning systems and satelite phones so that in the case of real emergency we can still be found. A local pilot told us how his friend went missing and was never found - he was swallowed by the jungle. It is a committing place when you fly over the jungle. We have been having fun on the flat lands testing our Italian miniplane paramotors and our Dudek Synthesis 34 wings. We fly in the early morning at sunrise and late in the afternoon when the conditions calm down. It is very hot. Internet connection is slow but here are some photos...