Utah, Petzl, and Paragliding

Our stop in Utah was the Salt Lake City area and what a beautiful place it is. We were surrounded by mountains and kept saying ” there isn’t a bad view no matter what direction you look” and that was very true. Despite being in the city and traffic the area is truly stunning in its beauty.

Project Airtime

We stayed for two days because I had planned a couple of things before arriving. My first planned stop was to go paragliding with Project Airtime. They are a nonprofit run by Chris Santacroce who is a Red Bull athlete specializing in free-flying sports and also flying airplanes. Of course like any good nonprofit it can’t run without some amazing volunteers. I got to fly with one of those amazing people, Blake Pelton.

Blake texted me that morning and set a time for around 5 pm that day but as anyone who flies knows, the weather is everything. We had to wait for a bit once I got there to have enough wind to make it possible to get both of us and the special wheelchair off the ground. While I waited the sky filled with paragliders and Blake took another lighter person flying. It was one of the most breathtaking things I have ever seen. I counted 20 parachutes at one time in the air. Yet with all that activity it was completely quiet and peaceful. The only sound was the occasional light wind. Some of the early starters who got into the air as soon as possible managed to make it thousands of feet into the air. It was quite a sight.

When Blake came back from flying with his client we jumped into the chair and got right into the air. We had a difficult time finding enough thermals to get us much height but we did manage to get a few hundred feet in the air or so above our starting point. We were already quite a ways up though as we started from a huge hill. We flew for about an hour and it was actually quite relaxing and peaceful. There is the initial thrill of leaving the ground and then it gets quiet and only the wind is heard. I got some really cool 360 video with the Samsung Gear 360. I have managed to upload one segment so far but will be posting the rest soon.

The view is quite different from being in a plane because your view is unencumbered by anything. It is really the closest thing to being a bird you will ever find.

Blake said I could come back the next day and try again since we didn’t get very high up and I struggled with changing my next appointment and trying to figure out the timing of driving the next day but in the end, I decided there just wasn’t time. I am planning to possibly swing through on my way back next fall and try again.

Petzl america

The next day I went to Petzl America. Petzl is a climbing gear company that also offers rope access gear for people that climb towers and things like that for work. I had been looking at the rope access harnesses for quite awhile and wondering if that might be the secret to getting a comfortable sitting position while I climb. I asked Brett Bowman if I could stop by on my way and he set the whole thing up for me to try out as many harnesses as I wanted.

I arrived at Petzl right when they opened at 9 am so that we could finish early enough to get on the road. We actually ended up coming back later in the afternoon to give more time to try out some ideas. I tried all the rope access harnesses and they didn’t fit quite right so we went for a simple web harness and it worked out perfectly. The harness was adjustable in all the right places and I was sitting straighter than I ever had before.

Antelope Island

While we were waiting to go back we decided to try going to Antelope Island State Park. This was the perfect place to go. It is actually an island with a causeway to access it. There is a herd of bison that live on the island as well as antelope and bighorn sheep. We saw a huge amount of bison and one even came quite close to the road near the van. It was quite exciting to see one that up close. Don’t worry though, we weren’t one of those tourists that tried to take a selfie with it, haha and no we didn’t try to put one of the babies in the back of the van.

This was definitely a memorable stop for sure. I can’t wait to go back and try flying again with Project Airtime. In the meantime be looking for the rest of my flight videos.