SAFA Skysailor Magazine

10 SKY SAILOR March | April 2021 by Tina Thorburn Traditionally, Christmas is a time to overeat, unwrap unwanted gifts, and have awkward conversations with family members who only seem to visit during the silly season. However, 2020 was anything but normal, so my Christmas this year was far from traditional. Having recently been bitten by the paragliding bug, I kindly excused myself from all family obligations and headed to the mountains with hopes of flying. As a fledgling pilot with under 40 hours and a freshly minted PG3 licence since mid- October, I was planning on doing a few sleddies and maybe fly to a nearby peak in an effort to practise my recently acquired XC skills from a course with Bright Flight earlier that month. From Mystic launch, in north-east Victoria, the day looked gorgeous. The more experienced XC pilots were talking about cloudbase and weather patterns as I admired the horse hair clouds (which I’ve since learned are called cirrus uncinus) and donned my colourful ski suit in preparation for a sleddie. As the first to launch at 10:30am, I happily went in search of lift. Now, I’m not one for Christmas presents, but I think I’ll ask for this every year from now: a 3m/s thermal straight off launch (thanks Santa!). Before I knew it, I was at 1650m radioing down how smooth everything was and watching other pilots scramble to get into the sky. Prior to this, the furthest I’d flown was 16km to Harrietville on an XC course under the expert guidance of an instructor. On Christmas Day, I watched all the big kids take off and head down the valley as I sheepishly went back and forth between two peaks I knew. Then came a crucial moment when I freed myself from the landing zone and committed to an outlanding. As a seasoned bike packer (where you strap your camping gear to your bike and ride off into the sunset for days, weeks, months), I am familiar with being in unknown terri- tory and adapting accordingly. However, I was somewhat overwhelmed with how different everything looked from up high! Was that Porepunkah or Ovens? What’s that valley between the Ovens and Kiewa? As the other gliders turned into specks, I made a few critical decisions: An Accidental Christmas Cross-Country Best Christmas ever!