Erick Angles <<atout.vents>>
writes:

Bleyne cross country Classik:

The Bleyne cross country Classik officially starts today with a couple dozens of
excellent cross country and Comp pilots. Yesterday was a warm up day for about
ten pilots already there and even with the strong eastern flow, there was some
great flights by Tonio landing just a few kms short from take off and Mark
Haycraft (multiple times Class 5 winner of the French OLC) who ends up doing
about 260 Kms out and return. He tells me that it was a stressful flight
though...

The weather is looking good for cross country flights for the next few days and
the Avionicus (this is the system was testing at Forbes 2015) live tracking for
this non-competition event is here:

http://avionicus.com/Bleynecross country2015

Since we couldn't make it mandatory because we don't have trackers to provide to
pilots, let's hope that most pilots will play the game and still use it on their
smart phones.

St Andre Open:

The St Andre Open (FAI Cat. 2) starts on Thursday but the first round of
registration starts Wednesday at 18:30 at HQ. Registration fee has increased
form 80 to 100 Euros since Wednesday the 7th but foreign pilots can still
register for the comp here:

http://delta.ffvl.fr/open_comps_registration_form/21/list

Most of the Swiss team and French team from the worlds in Valle de Bravo are
coming down so that should be interesting ;o)

The Avionicus livetracking page for the comp:
http://avionicus.com/StAndreOpen2015

I am very pleased to confirm that shuttle to take off and retrieve services will
be provided at no extra cost for the participants.

Here is the FB event page:
https://www.facebook.com/events/358700320921446/361672347290910/

You can also follow us on twitter

CBF, AV & Nepal:

Now, a little word on Nepal and Cloud Base Foundation: Since I created Atout
Vents in 2010 in order to organize the Fly Morocco 2011 flight camp, I have been
quite concerned by the concept of ethical travel and tourism and I have been
thinking about a specific project though the CBF foundation and their slogan:
Help Children Wherever We Fly! The project is to help some Moroccan kids to get
proper education and actually be able to go to school as the area we were in is
quite remote and deserted. Sadly, this project has actually been on hold until I
find the time, motivation and energy to go through with the second edition of
Fly Morocco.

What is the link with Nepal? Well, meanwhile, the earthquake in Nepal happened a
couple weeks ago and as most of you know, the Cloud Base Foundation is heavily
involved in Nepal though their local arm, Karma Flights:
http://www.karmaflights.org  and even more so since the earthquake:
http://www.karmaflights.org/home-2/international-translations

I was lucky enough to visit this country before the earthquake and like most of
the people who go there, I fell in love with the culture and I am deeply touched
and saddened by what has been happening there. So in the last few days, I have
been racking my brain and been talking with Isabella (Director of Karma Flights)
and Nick (One of the Head Honcho of CBF) because I wanted to help them in their
effort of helping the local community without knowing how. I have seen Free
flight schools all over the place offering tandem flights with proceeds going to
CBF etc. but Atout Vents being a non for profit NGO and not a school (well at
least not yet as I still need 5 days in a school to validate my instructor
certificate) we don't have any 'income'.

Friday night, a friend told me that I should organise a Loto/Tombola during the
St Andre Open and I thought it was a great idea! So I sent a mail to all
registered pilots to ask them if they would be willing to forfeit the prizes
planned for the various podiums so they could be won in the loto at the end of
the comp. I am still waiting on the OK from the pilots but I hope they will
agree and all the proceeds would go to CBF. I am actually hoping to go there
myself in a couple weeks or so to help because they do need money but they also
do need 'Boots on the ground'. Here is a little video that says it all:

https://vimeo.com/127369733

If the pilots agree then people who buy tickets will be able to win some Flytec
instruments, some great flying books and DVDs sponsored by cross country
Magazine, a couple Drag Chutes sponsored by Ellipse, some clothes and even a
GoPro and smaller items. I realize that people not at the open will have no
interest in this (well actually, I don't mine selling tickets to who ever will
want some, but I figured that maybe that could give an idea to other comp
organizers this season in case they wanted to help but didn't know how to.)