Tag: instructor

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WHAT A WEEKEND!!!!

I don’t have the time to write up a full post today, but I just want to write a quick thank you to everyone at Skydive Gananoque! Will, Tom and Michelle are excellent hosts and I have to say that I consider them a GIFT to the skydive community. If you’re a fun jumper, you know what I’m talking about when I say that it’s frustrating going on a trip somewhere, wanting to get some freefall action, arriving at the DZ to find out that it’s a tandem factory or one of those places that “fly when we feel like it”.

Everyone at Gan was excited to get into the sky and just have some fun!

Lucie (One of Skydive Addiction’s newest members who I look forward to reading) hit her 100th jump over the weekend (Video of the pieing to come). And Will was nice enough to organize the load for a 15 way.

Since it was day 1, some of us got to go up for a Tandem Refresh with the tandem masters. (A tandem refresh is done every year for everyone with a tandem master rating. Basically, what it consists of is the tandem master takes an experienced skydiver up for a tandem to make sure that he still is able to fly and knows what he’s doing and also to brush off the cobwebs.)

As a skydiver, I can say that it’s a very exhilarating feeling and brings back the whole adrenaline rush from your first time! You now know what’s going on, but you don’t have control over it as you aren’t piloting the canopy. I was in good hands, but it’s still a different experience. It was quite fun, I must say!

I’ll have a full article of our trip up later this week along with pictures and some videos.

In the meantime though, here’s a picture of our campfire: Yes, that’s right, we didn’t use logs, we used an entire tree for our fire!
Thank you Will for making it possible by using the tractor to bring us all the wood we needed to keep this fire going (Video to come as well)

 

Blue ones in the meantime!

Adam

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Brushing off the cobwebs

I’m going to  be heading to do some tunnel time at Skyventure next week to brush off the cobwebs, grease the joints and just have some laughs with my friend Luc who was with me on the trip to PST last month.

Important note for those of you who live in the Montreal area: Skyventure is raising their prices as of April 1st 2012. It is a significant price increase, so for those of you who want to get their tunnel time, get it ASAP.

Also, Mike and I are working on a redesign of Skydive Addiction, we have a new logo in the works and we’ll possibly change things up a bit. If any of you have any suggestions, please drop me a line here.

Blue Skies,
Adam

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Follow-up post!

So Will at Skydive Gananoque was nice enough to get in touch with me, I got permission to tell you all where we’ll be.
Hopefully some of you will get to join us for the opener!

For those of you that won’t, well as always I’ll have a review of my stay as well as a bunch of pictures. (But seriously.. Come jump with us)
SIDE NOTE: If you’re not a licensed skydiver, but still want to join us, they have tandems CHEAP!!!!! Book one, it’ll make me smile to see you experience it! (No I’m not paid to say this)

We’ll be heading down on the 30th, partying the night before, waking up at the break of dawn, taking FULL advantage of our day there and our night by the campfire.
Anyone who reads this, come up to me and I’ll gladly hand you a beer from the case I’ll be buying… To find out why I’m buying, you’ll have to ask me in person when I open it for you.
There’s no guarantees that I’ll be wearing the winging beauty crown again, but I’m sure there will be plenty of others to entertain you all.

Blue ones everyone! See you in 25 days!

Adam

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PST Pics – Taken by Steve Tambosso

So I got in touch with Steve Tambosso the local photographer at PST.

He sent me some REALLY sweet pictures that he shot.

You can check them out below: (Click on them to zoom)

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An inspiring story.

So my friend Manon is a great writer. Her boyfriend Luc is a skydiver and he introduced her to the sport a short while ago.

This is her story:

Homage to my man

Written by: Manon Corbeil
Translated by: Adam A

Well, well! Those of you who know me know quite well that sometimes I need to write to clear my mind…

My new friends however, don’t know this about me… Tonight, It’s to them that I dedicate this as I feel like I’m about to explode and it just has to come out!!

And who’s responsible this time?

Yep… Again him… I already owe him so much from the last three years…

How did it start you ask?

The birds… That passion developed itself very early during my adolescence when I lived in the beautiful town of Dorval. A classmate pointed out that in Dorval we could easily identify over 200 different species of birds… I figured he was lying until one day I actually started paying attention to those same birds! To their singing, their silhouettes, the way they fly… Their actions.. With time I managed to recognize and even identify them with ease and also, as incredible as it may seem. I managed to feel exactly what those birds feel during flight!

I hear you all saying: “She’s fucked in the head!”  Uhhh yeah, I admit it, I must be and I won’t hide it. I do however remain convinced that I was a bird in another life – Most probably an eagle – I’m very happy to believe this.
I was always comfortable with the idea that I was a bird in my past life and I never had any difficulty accepting the fact that my present life was to be that of a human and that flight was impossible…Therefore, the desire to find myself as free as the wind between the earth and the sky was always quite present deep down inside of me and I must admit that I was extremely pulled towards hang gliding at a certain point in my life.
Circumstances and obligations of day to day life often have the unwanted effect of pushing our dreams aside, until one day we finally convince ourselves that these dreams are to remain dreams and that desire ends up becoming nothing but fantasy… An unfulfilled fantasy. With the years that pass we finally tell ourselves that these dreams or fantasies are simply “not for us” and we find all the good reasons to finally reject the idea and simply scrapping all those dreams that never became a reality…
 WRONG!
It’s crazy how our perspectives can change from that moment when we decide that things are “accessible”!In my case, I only needed one person to convince me so!! That everything is possible!!! That as long as the desire is there, anything is possible!!!
This same person convinced me, more often than I’ve had to convince him and for multiple reasons, that we can. That if we simply want it enough, we can accomplish all of our desires!!
How can I even begin to show how much I appreciate this person? I pump all the love that I am able to find inside of my heart out and give it entirely to this person, because he is mine and I love him deeply with a love in it’s realest and purest form.

Where was I? Oh yeah… Flying… Like a bird…

My man… He’s a skydiver. He’s been one for a long time, and for reasons that differ from my own but have just as deep an effect, he found himself obligated at a certain point in his life to put this passion of his aside…
It was only in August 2010 that he had the initiative to give me a thank you gift – for helping him with some difficult renovations – that gift was the gift of a tandem skydive at Voltige.

A dream, that dream, the one that I had pushed away deep down inside me and closed beneath a bunch of different experiences finally came back to surface! I was given the chance to FLY!!! Me? I couldn’t believe it!
But… That day… I felt… I savored… I flew.. The sky!!! It was…. magical! Extraordinary!! A sensation that I can’t even begin to describe… You have to live it to understand it!
But then the days passed… Then the months… Winter arrived… I finally came back to earth..
Come spring 2011, he’s in need. His vital urge to “jump”… I can’t comprehend it…
I decided to accompany him during one of his days at the drop zone… And then… That was it! A mechanism went off inside of me… I want to “understand” I want to “live it”!
But, I remained silent for weeks because deep down inside of me “it’s just not for me”… Then one day, it just turned off… And I repeated to myself:It’s crazy how our perspectives can change from that moment when we decide that things are “accessible”!I want to become a skydiver! It’s finally clear! I’m 43 years old and I don’t care!
August 18th: I started my wind tunnel training with Philippe.August 20th: I was doing my theory school with the marvelous Gina. I had the intention of doing my first jumps the same day… Unfortunately, it was too windy and I had to wait until August 27th for that to happen.

4 jumps in the same day! All accompanied by my mentor Gina!
Those 4 jumps were incredibly meaningful to me… I accomplished a dream… I felt like I had achieved a step towards being myself, way farther then I had ever thought. Never would I have believed that I could do 4 jumps in the same day! I succeeded at them all on top of that!

Gina knew how to take care of me regardless of how fearful she knew I was. She knew how to convince me that I could do it, she knew just the right words to say.. I owe her enormously! Surely I was a huge challenge for her! Bravo and thank you Gina!

Then came Richard’s turn to accompany me in the sky for a jump. It was cloudy, but we decided to go anyway. It was a beautiful jump… Beautiful until the moment I was to open my parachute…. A little moment of panic in my eyes, I couldn’t find the pilot chute handle…. Richard saw it in my eyes and quickly came to my rescue. Thankfully, I managed to find the handle… Phew!

Next came my first solo jump… I absolutely needed to do it the same day as my last accompanied jump because the last one didn’t go too well (stupid pilot chute!) I couldn’t permit myself to make things worse.. Once again, this jump was into the clouds… And regardless of all that happened, I had the joy of experiencing this all alone for the first time in the magnificent sky above Joliette..

A week past between this jump and the next…. Just enough time for that famous fear to ingrain itself inside me again. In my opinion, it will always be present and I will now have to learn to “deal with it”. This time, it was Annie who “kicked my butt” because truthfully, as soon as I got to the drop zone, I didn’t want to jump at all. Just like Gina did, she knew exactly the right words to convince me to jump!

All these solo jumps… What more can I say but: WOW! Pure happiness!

This super long text to finally thank a bunch of great people…

Everyone at Voltige truly is perfect!

Thank you Richard for my Tandem… Thank you Philippe for the wind tunnel… Thank you Gina for… For everything! (You know what I mean) Thank you Mario, Olivier and Daniel for the radio assistance (And the hugs)… Thank you Annie for the kick in the butt and for your inspiration (Your pictures and videos) thank you Dino for being my cameraman during my exam… Thank you Manifest girls for your patience (My millions of calls and all)

Thank you everyone at Voltige! You are amazing! Thank you to all my new skydiver friends!!!

But most of all… Thank you Luc, my man… All this is thanks to you! I love you!

Manon

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You’re never too old to skydive!

A friend of mine who happens to be a Francophone skydiver from Quebec only took up the sport a few years ago.

She’s someone who impresses me. She has her motorcycle license, she has her skydiving license and she’s just an overall “bad ass” woman.

She gave me permission to post an article that she wrote up for Canpara (Canadian version of Parachutist)

This is the article:

Skydiving in your early 50s?
Written by Normande Cournoyer
Translaled by Gaëlle Vercollier

Yes, it is possible. ln 2004, around the end of the summer, I was
looking for a special project to undertake the following year. As
I was reading the paper one morning, an article really caught
my attention. A woman in her eighties had done a tandem skydive.
Suddenly, I remembered I had been having a recurring dream for a very
long time. I was flying off into the sky and it was always very pleasant.
June 11,2005, was the first tandem, a memorable day spent in total
euphoria. While taking Lebeau Road in Farnham which leads to the
Nouvel Air site, a song by Natasha St-Pier was playing on the radio:
To each their own story (Chacun son histoire) with the following lyrics:
“Taking off, flying, Burning one’s wings, To go through the sky, To
write one’s story … )” What a coincidence! I was far from thinking it was
the beginning of a beautiful adventure.

Well, yes, five weeks later, I was in the air for a second tandem.
Believe me, a third one almost occurred.

Seeing my need for adrenaline, one of my close friends suggested I
take some skydiving lessons. This idea was eating at me because I was in
my early fifties. After some research, information given by people in the
circle and encouragement given by a person who started skydiving at
47, I decided to follow the PAC program in the summer of 2006. I told
myself that I would regret it if didn’t give it a try.

Unfortunately, I was unable to complete my training in 2006 for
various reasons: difficulties, lack of available time and whims of Mother
Nature. One Friday morning, my heart wasn’t really into skydiving.
While going to Nouvel Air, I made a stop to have coffee and think
about what was best for me. While looking at the paper, I read a quote
by Nicholas Macrozo who belongs to the world of Canadian athletics:
“Sornetimes, you have ta take a step back in order to take two forward.”
I had just found my answer. I was stopping everything for now. My
solution was to go to a vertical wind tunnel.

On three occasions I found myself in the New Hampshire wind
tunnel with amazing instructors from Nouvel Air (Martin and Vincent
Lemay and Mario Prévost). Results followed one progress after another.
This past 16th of July, Solo certified, I was flying on my own in
Farnham’s sky.
From the time I made the decision to go on a tandem up until my
Solo certification, my journey had faced obstacles. Fortunately, the main
difficulties were encountered during the winter. Before the tandem,
I had a crow’s-foot tendonitis, the following year, surgery on the big
toe, and to top it off, last winter, tendonitis in both shoulders, I didn ‘t
find that one funny… With perseverance and hard work, I was able to
get back into shape. What is marvelous is that my physical condition is
better than it ever was.

Skydiving for me is to be in a new dimension: feeling of freedom,
of space around oneself, feeling the control of my body on the air.
While being safe, it’s the search for new feats. To fly off into this bluish
dimension is pure pleasure.

Presently, my objective is to continue having fun while progressing.
Who knows, maybe the A license? Only the future will tell.
I am proud to be a new skydiver in her early fifties. It’s the
achievement of a dream and a big challenge. I just had to believe in it
and face the encountered obstacles and provide the necessary energies.
My motto: “The only challenges lost ahead of time are the ones not
taken up. There wouldn’t be anything worse than to resign to defeat
without finally having tempted to be victorious”.

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Skydive Varadero

So I just got back from Varadero Cuba…
Absolutely had to pop into the local DZ to check it out and hopefully to do a few jumps with the locals…
Turned out it’s a tandem factory, but they’re fairly welcoming to other skydivers. Weather didn’t permit us to jump on the day of my visit, so we played dominoes together…
(I snapped some photos, but haven’t developed them yet)

The DZ is actually owned by the government there, they fly a 20 seat soviet chopper (didn’t get to snap any photos of it though)
Depending on wind conditions, you either land on their badly maintained field or on the beach in front of your hotel.

Equipment-wise, they’ve got the standard canopies/containers (American brands, but bought through Europe).

The staff is extremely welcoming, but the facilities need work… There’s only about 15-20 skydivers that live in the area, the rest are all tandem tourists.
A jump ticket is 25 CUC (+ – 30$), they go up to 11000 feet.

Weather never ended up permitting me to jump, so my friends and I decided to rent some scooters and go to town on our 5th day. We got into an accident and I sprained my ankle… Karma of course came into play and the following days were perfect for skydiving… I sat next to the pool watching planes fly by.
Needless to say, that part sucked.

Hope you’re all having a very blue off season!

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Where am I?

As a follow-up to my post My original plan for this year… My actual results

I’m now at 62 jumps, I’ve spent about 5000$ on the sport (not counting the 1750$ for the solo course, the 350$ for the jump suit, the 280$ for my protrack, 260$ for my full face, my 100$ for my Altimaster II or the 1200$ spent going to Florida to take that solo course)

I’ve just passed my B license, (Yes, Got my B 15 jumps after passing my A).
I’ve not only passed the B license exam… I got 96.25% on it… According to my DZO, it’s the highest grade he’s ever seen =D.

I now have an altimaster II galaxy altimeter, a tony suits jump suit, a protrack audible, a factory diver full face, a packing tool and a huge smile on my face.

I did however decide to slow down on the purchases and decided not to buy a rig this year.
I’m going to start paying off some debts for now and maybe buy one next year.

As it stands, I’ve now surpassed my 2 year goal on the sport haha.

Next step: Coach 1 lessons and maybe Rigger A.

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What a birthday!

It’s been 4 days since then, and I’m still feeling the after effects of Saturday.

I started everything off by partying with some friends Friday night and got to bed around 4:30AM…
Woke up the next morning at 8:00AM to pick up some friends at the Metro (Subway) and then head to the DZ.
My mom, being a pastry chef decided that she wanted to make me some cookies and brownies to bring with me, so I had about 3 boxes of junk food with me along with my skydive gear, a small ziplock back full of cherries, my box of Gatorade powder and a huge smile on my face because the sky was just so perfectly blue!

We arrive at the DZ at about 10:00AM, I have 7 people who came along with me to do a tandem jump for the first time, they’re as excited as I am…
My buddy Alex who’s also a skydiver decided that he wanted to pop in and bring me a gift… The most wonderful gift a person can give a skydiver… He didn’t want to tell me what it was over the phone, all he said was that it’s golden and that he thought of me when he bought it.

I had no idea what to expect, in my head I was thinking “hmm, golden and he thought of me… Does this guy have a thing for me or something?”
After a few laughs at that idea, he pulled the gift out from behind his back… a Heineken Draughtkeg!!!!!
Draughtkeg

This is probably the best thing one can give a skydiver…

So I proceeded to hide it behind the manifest’s desk to be sure no one taps it open before I get to it.
(Many laughs about the disappearing keg followed later on which I’ll write about)

So i manifest myself on a first load, do a 2way with a buddy at the DZ, we decide that today we’re gonna do fun jumps that aren’t serious.
First exit: Roller coaster! I’m in front in a seated position with my legs pointing forward in front of me, his legs are on my sides, I’m holding onto his leg grips and he’s holding onto my shoulder grips.
We jumped out facing the wind instead of back to the wind, so we span all over the place going first feet forward looking down, then ended up looking up towards the plane. Was a blast!

We did some formation work after stabilizing, we grabbed arms, he satellited around me, then grabbed my arms again, then I went around him, grabbed his arms and so on.
This was his official 100th jump. (Unofficially however it was an 8way :P)

We landed exactly on point…. The instructors at the DZ however…. Landed in the soy bean fields hahahahaha!

2nd jump, two of the tandems I brought along were on the plane, one was nervous, the other was extatic.

We decided to do a head down exit, so we grabbed onto each other’s shoulder grips, jumped out, stayed head down for a few seconds, stabilized, did the same thing as the last jump, except this time after going around one side, we’d inverse and go the other side.
Again, perfect landing.

3rd jump, 2 more tandems come on (hopefully one will be doing his AFF soon)
did a 4 way with an H position exit, we were fairly sloppy on the exit (*AHEM* *Fabien* *COUGH* *COUGH*
We lost major stability and took a while to get back together… Actually, we never did, they all fell faster than I did and I couldn’t catch up before 5k feet.

Great landing though…. so golden that I had to run towards my canopy so that it wouldn’t catch wind and pull me off my feet…
Then I realize that I ran onto the runway as the plane is landing, so I have to run back….
running towards canopy

running from canopy

The tandems were extatic at the end of the jump hugging each other and yelling in the field.

4th jump was another 4way, same people, same exit except this time, the person who will remain unnamed took an easier position (tail of the H only has to jump backwards, no need to position himself into the wind or anything)
The exit is flawless this time, we stabilize… Except when we started the 1st point, this same person *COUGH* *COUGH!* Sorry bad cold…
Turned the wrong way.. apparently he doesn’t know right from left 😛

So he ended up face to face with the person next to him, being an open circle, we lost balance with the relative wind and split up again. Well he did, the other 3 of us stayed together… hahaha

Great landing again 😛

Another friend showed up to wish me a happy birthday, she surprised me as I was walking back with my rig on my shoulder from this jump. She came by to simply do one jump with me then continue on her way.
So we did a 2 way, also with a head down exit as before.
During freefall, I turned to my right, she gripped my sides, then went around gripped the other side, then came in front of me, she turned, I gripped her sides, went around, gripped the other side, then went in front of her.

Golden landing, she then went on her way and I planned to do one last jump with the same person as earlier.

6th jump was a solo, practiced for my B license series.

7th jump was a sunset load, I did another 2way with my buddy from earlier, we decided to do some back flying. we basically just spun around in circles for fun for the last jump.
Under canopy at 1 km in the air (3000 feet) while the sun has just finished setting is one of the most amazing feelings ever!

Afterwards, we were all hanging around the DZ trying to figure out whether or not to go out for food or to order pizza.
I broughts out the keg, others cracked open some bottles…
We then realized that there were no cups to be found… SACRILEGE!
I put the keg down, turn my back to talk to someone, turn around to see one of the tandem masters as he says bye to me to then look down and see that he’s hiding something under his shirt.
His statement: “What keg?”

Similar jokes were cracked over the next 20 minutes.

The DZO set up a bonfire and then ordered pizza for everyone. We all sat around the fire, drank, laughed, etc… Until about midnight when people started leaving.
I went to an after hours with my friend and partied till the sun came up… Litterally 🙂

I’m still sore 😛

My Factory Diver should be in this week. I also ordered a Protrack so reviews should be up soon 🙂

Blue ones everybody!

-Adam

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A quick welcome to…

The newest addition to the family!

When I spoke to AJ, he seemed very very very enthusiastic about his future addiction….
He’s starting his skydive lessons tomorrow.

So this is both a good luck, and a welcome to the family!

Blue Skies!
-Adam