Thursday, July 22, 2010

The Europeans

Not getting much time to blog and the old laptop is failing.



Great  apartment

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Ager practice

Had 4 good days practice flying the Spanish Nationals tasks. Stable and technical a couple of days. rough the 3rd then a strong smooth day.
Taking a rest today while the opening ceremony is on. Had sprogs measured this morning, OK. looking forward to the Holland / Spain final tonight!

Jamie helping Nick and in goal. I was able to jump in Nick's car with Carl and Jamie. Carl came 3rd in the Spanish Nats.


Heading into the mountains.

Jumped in with James Stinnert and Larry for the comp. Sue, Lyn and Ally will be able to share the driving.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Alex shops till I drop and on to Ager

Adelaide - Melbourne -Singapore - London - Barcelona was a long haul and left us pretty shattered. To our suprise our luggage turned up and the taxi found our accommodation. We used airbnb.com to find a couple who share their appartment only 400m from Sagrada familia and a couple of Metro stops from the centre of town. With recommendations online it works out OK.
To beat jetlag, and because we are about to spend two weeks in the backwoods of the spanish coutryside,  I had promised to spend a couple of days shopping with Ally. She was in heaven scoring an excess baggage full of bargains.


we plan to take this back to Aus (won't have to frieght glider)



Sagrada Familia
Ali in the Happy Pills shop
A local girl, Mons, who has driven for pilots in Australia, offered to help get my glider from the airport and arranged a lift up to Ager with Salvador the Euros organiser. They were both incredibly generous with their time. The beaurocratic process of clearing the glider lived up to its reputation. Everyone I dealt with had to copy my passport, and just when I thought we were in the clear customs decided they wanted to open the glider box. Problem was the freight company could not find the glider. How do you lose a 4m box? Eventually with workers scouring the warehouse it turned up, customs accepted I was not smuggling anything and Salvador showed Alex what a brand new C5 Citroen will do with a glider on the roof.

It turns out Salvador's daughters Anna and Maria are helping with the organisation and Ally has been roped in to help aswell.

It is always a relief to get the glider unboxed, rebuilt and rigged in one piece. Seeing a forklift pick up a box with all that carbon in it is an anxious moment.