Paragliding

I always wanted to fly. Always. Don`t know why. Never really ask myself. It is what it is.

At the very beginning I was too young. When I turned 13, I had to take a break from climbing because of some finger problems. But I wanted to stay active. So I started paragliding.

Once again I was lucky at this point. My Dad has a paragliding teacher (instructor)  license. It was not too much work to convince him. “ Yeah, we can do that. At least, I know what you learn this way“. Just my mum was not really happy with my idea. But she accepted my decision. She used to fly herself, before I was born.

At 14, I did all the exams to get my official flying license. I passed all the tests without any problem. But when I tried to pick up the license on my 16th birthday, they told me, I had been too young at the time of the tests. So I had to do the practical part once again.

No problem. And a couple of weeks later I also got my XC-License. What a nice feeling. No more limitations because of age or wrong license. I can fly now wherever I want, as long as I respect the rules and  my skills are good enough to fulfill my ideas. Very cool.

Last year, I tried to combine climbing and flying as good as possible. Like in Briancon. We startet at a small hill a couple of hundred meters above the valley into the first thermals of the day. At noon we had Mt. Blanc in the background and jumped from one 4000m high peak to the next one. Very impressive. After landing we had a quick snack and went climbing in the nearby valley, where I finished a 8b that I had checked out the day before. What a day.

Last year I had my first bigger success at flying. I got an invitation to the NOVA-Juniors-Pilots-Team. Very cool. Now I have the chance to learn from some of the best XC-Pilots around. Big Thanks to all the people involved in this decision.