Fly Boy - Episode 61 - SIV at 'Rise Paragliding', China!

After flying for over 25 years (I learnt in 1996 when I was 16), I have finally gotten round to doing my first SIV course! Why in China? Well the simple reason is because we are taking the year off to spend 12 months here in China (as my wife is from Tianjin in North China). We are halfway through and due to come back mid-October 24.

I have been looking for places to fly, and so far not being very successful and done very little flying here in China which has been quite difficult, but someone told me about this place in Southwest China called, 'Rise paragliding' which was founded by Theo De Blic and Jack Pimblett who is British.

Anyway, I managed to persuade my wife for us all to go for the 15-day course which costs around £780 (not including going up the mountain and other extras like lunch, safety boat use and hotel expenses). But it seemed pretty reasonable to me for a 15-day course. But the best thing about it is you can come back anytime for the rest of your life for free! Apart from the extra costs of course.

I'm very pleased I've done it because I have learnt vital and valuable stuff. I'm sorry that I've not been able to include that much footage of flying, but I really wanted to focus on doing the maneuvers without having to worry about the camera, but I hope you do find this video enjoyable and somewhat helpful. If you've never done an SIV course, I highly recommend that you do. I didn't think it was that important until now. I've done it, and I realised that this course could definitely save my life one day. 

My instructor, Tim is an Acro pilot and a very experienced coach. He is excellent and very very quick on the radio. I have been told by a few different people that this is the best SIV place in China. I didn't even realise that there was an SIV camp in China until now. Many thanks Tim and Alex (Tim's coach and also his number one Acro student).

My wife and children came with me. The reason they did was because I would not have been able to hire a car on my own, as I'm not officially allowed to drive with an English licence. Plus I don't speak Chinese well enough to have been able to travel around on my own yet so I was very grateful for them to come with me and also give me moral support as I did find it a little bit nerve-wracking at times, especially doing my first stalls. I have now done over 20 stalls and I feel so much more comfortable and I even started to enjoy doing them. In the end I've managed to improve my wingovers and looking forward to do more practise now next time I get some good height. 

I had to spend extra money renting a wing unfortunately because mine was not suitable for SIV being a hybrid so that was an additional cost but only came to £180 for 6 days so not too bad. 

If you've never done an SIV course, please do one. It may well save your life in the future and I highly recommend you come here if you ever get the chance. 

Thanks for watching!