
So I had the opportunity to go back over to France for a weekend, to go flying. I had the chance to hang out with my friends from Gubbio Italy, as well, and get a chance to “Fly” Italian! First off, the Italians have an incredible ability to create some very favorable characters, that are not copies, or nock offs, and they are fantastic. One of their most recent is the BoneFish. This creation looks like a Fish Head and skeleton, in cartoon depiction, and they make them in any color you can imagine. They fly all by themselves, but for the festival and tight quarters, they were always on a pilot. I learned a lot from my Italian friends, mainly that yes, you can fly very high, and make a much steadier pilot. Well, to be exact, over 2.5 spools, and over 800+ feet in the air. While I was a bit shocked by this, (I normally only fly at 300 ft.) I told my friend Moreno, “In America, if you fly over 500 feet, you have to have a license on the object, so I only fly at 300 feet.” he looked at me and said, “Yes, in Italy, we cannot fly over 100 meters as well, or you get in trouble” I took by the unsaid smile, and twinkle in his eye, that hey, we were in France, and anything went, since we did not know the laws, so to speak. So of course, I asked the dumb question, “What is the length in France?” the response I received with a devilish smile and a school boy giggle was, “I am sure its the same in France”. This pretty much summarized my trip, a lot of fun, and a lot of mischief, however, nothing that would get us in much trouble.
I learned that getting up at 8 AM did not mean you would be to the flying field by 9:45, but you would make it before 10:00. I also learned that while we may have gotten to the field “On Time” the Italian ability to find room to fly was no problem. The easy going weekend, always found us sharing pilots, or sharing line, or at times, combining line, to go very high to get stable winds on the beach. A great lesson in cooperation. An even better lesson in friendship as well. If you take a look at the pictures page, you will find many new pictures up from this festival in Martigues, France. It was a small town outside of Marseille, and was very near the airport. Which made getting to and fro my flights very easy. I left Omaha o Wednesday afternoon, and returned the following Monday afternoon, as one of my co-workers said, I took a long weekend to Europe. That long weekend was exactly what the doctor ordered. I was able to enjoy a great time, with good weather the entire weekend. I enjoy flying in Europe, but for that matter, I also enjoy flying in the USA as well. It was just interesting to think that there were flyers there from Italy, France, Turkey, Tunisia, Malaysia, India and Brazil. Its not often you get an opportunity to be able to enjoy such a situation, and have great food, as well as wonderful friendship that knows no international boundaries. More on that maybe later this week.
If you look at the picture to the left, you will notice blue sky, but if you look really close, yes, Virginia, there is a kite way up there. Probably illegally, and I am sure an Italian and an American broke all kinds of international laws that day considering air space, however, on that day, for those hours, we really did not care 🙂 Have a great day. – Jeff