First SIV, Paragliding Oludeniz, May 2024

Описание: This was my first SIV and with hindsight was at least 4 years overdue.
I went with Lee Tryhorn's Free Flight Academy (www.freeflightacademy.com) as he came highly recommended. Paying that forward I too cannot recommend him enough.

This video is a bit long, even for me, but half of it is SIV manoeuvres for which I have included Lee's instruction over the radio and some explanation of what I was doing most wrong to help make sense of it.
00:00 to 03:30 Buses, Tickets and taking off
03:30 to 08:10 is the SIV
08:10 onwards is flying and watching some acro

There's lots that is not in the video:

I didn't mention the web page listing the launches and their wind status:
https://shmfethiye.kapadokya.edu.tr/en/
but this is not always updated so the best option is to walk into Sky Sports halfway down the main street in Oludeniz and ask them if the launches / cablecar are running.

I also didn't mention the private buses which drive all the way up to the launch, useful when the cablecar is not operating for any reason. To catch one of this simply wait in one of the bus stops on the route, wing on your back and whenever a bus passes with an empty seat they will stop and ask if you want to hop in. Again they will stop at the cablecar ticket office anyway because you need to buy a launch pass but if not taking the cablecar you don't need to buy the 150TL ticket. However, the cost of the bus to the launch is also 150TL or just to the cablecar is 30TL. You can expect loud Turkish pop music for the entire journey too :-)

Life vests were supplied by Free Flight Academy for the SIV and Lee conducts the courses from sitting in the safety boat, so if there is a reserve deployment Lee can get to you quickly.

If you are just going to practise on your own then you can rent life vests by the day from Sky Sports. If you do deploy a reserve and end up in the water then local safety boats should be on hand to help and it is my understanding that they are not allowed to charge you for fishing you out of the water...
However, they will rescue your equipment too and the charge for getting that back is 80 Euros! and you'll want to pay that quickly so you can wash the salt out ASAP.

I could write pages on the SIV and what small and big things I learned form it...but basically I learned loads of stuff that I already thought I knew.
Honestly I had a reasonable idea of where to look, what brake to pull, how and when to weighshift, what to do with my legs etc...and yet i barely did one of those things properly! Guided practise in a safe an encouraging environment is what's needed and Lee provides all that in spades and with (mostly) good humour.
I say mostly because Lee has an extensive back catalog of the worst dad jokes ever. Seriously, you've been warned.
Aside from that? the whole experience was nothing short of amazing...

And what a place Oludeniz is; nice people - both locals and the guys on the SIV and Acro courses, top knotch kebabs (there was other food but who cares :-)), smooth air (once over the water anyway) and the Agean(?) has shades of blue that need to be seen to be believed.

I'm definitely going back, only question is when?