Today was a hang gliding day. I didn’t take the helmet cam this week. This is mainly because I got to the car without it and going back up 4 floors to get it when we were already running late was just too much for my “don’t go backwards” approach to life.

I hand my iPhone to Pat when we arrive in the hope that he might take a useful video from the Kubota, but he was too busy driving to do any filming. I did take one still shot from the hill of the gliders lined up on the small hill in the distance.

I have a really good day flying. My first flight is just plain fun. Even though I flared too late and didn’t land on my feet, it felt good to be in the air. It’s flights like these that make me think maybe I really do want to fly off the mountain–after all, wouldn’t it be nice to have 8 minutes in the air instead of 8-12 seconds?

All the landings on the training hills–all 150+ of them–have taken their toll. My knees and hips feel like they’ve aged 20 years. While I joke about getting old, I’ve usually had a hard time remembering I’m not 25 anymore. My knees and hips scream “YOU’RE NOT 25!” at me every time I stand now. I’m sure walking dogs in heels all winter hasn’t helped. I’ve started wearing my fivefingers shoes again now that it’s warming up. It’s helping, but it does look pretty silly.

I wish it was warm enough to wear them on the training hills today, but it was only in the 20’s when we first arrived. Fortunately, it warmed up quickly. After getting in about about 10 fantastic flights, 8 of which I totally stick the landing, it’s time to head up top.

The wind isn’t acceptable for a novice rated pilot, so I am relieved I don’t have to decide if I’m really ready to launch from the mountain. Instead, we do some paper work–I am now an officially rated pilot with a membership in the USHPA and Pat and I are official members of the Lookout Mountain Flight Park. Since it doesn’t look like the weather is going to be good enough for a tandem training flight either, I cancel my tandem flight and we head to the Longhorn (not to be confused with the chain steakhouse) to gorge on eggs and bacon.

Apparently Tisen is not the dog-years equivalent of 25 anymore either–his walk mimics mine after running free all morning.

At sunset, I continue my HDR experiments with some high-contrast photos. This time, I find the info button so I can make sure I get the exposures I need to maximize the effectiveness of this technique. I figure this will be a better test.

In the end, I still like the lighting effects achieved this way in the black and white shot, but generally prefer the manually adjusted photos over the multi-exposure combined images. Which do you like?