Amor del vuelo

My airplane is quiet, and for a moment still an alien, still a stranger to the ground, I am home. — Richard Bach

Man has wanted to fly in the air since time immemorial...

In the olden days, he wanted to fly because of a desire to triumph over nature and achieve what humans arent designed for...

Today, some fly for faster transportation....some do it to bomb cities...some do it for scientific purposes....I wanna fly cos its a passion and for the pure thrill and exhilaration of hearing the wind blow past your ears while you fly like a bird..

Hi, i am Harit and i am an adrenaline junkie !!...and to get high on it, i have done everything from Bungee jumping to Paragliding...but the quest for the ultimate still continues!!.

Last weekend, me and a couple of friends made a trip down to mysore(50 kms from bangalore) to check out Monsieur Vrata's microlight plane hangar and fly there because of the fact thats its way more easier to fly from mysore airport than the buzzing bangalore airport. Good day trip with the french(vrata) family and american(Q) , visiting the chamundi hills and big bull ..but besides flying the X-Air microlights, the trip was also to try out this hi tech contraption called Paramotor.

Now this is how the paramotor works:

1. Take the 20 kg bag which is full of assembly parts out of the car (25 Kgs is the weight of a fully fueled paramotor)

2. Assemble the paramotor from its components in 5 easy steps ( 15 mins)

3. Put the assembled fan on your back , Place the parachute assembly in front of you and fire up the motor.

4. Make a run of around 20 meters to get the parachute in the air and place the weight on your back for the required thrust from the outward facing fan to get you off the ground...

5. Voila!!!..up you go in the air flying reaching an altitude of 2000 feet in about a minute.

Now, The most impressive thing about the paramotor is that you can take off and land anywhere where you can find a stretch of flat ground of around 20 mts!! It has a highly refined motor design and it runs on normal petrol with a max ground speed of 120 kmph.

Imagine having a 20 kg backpack which mutates into a big fan and parachute ..enabling you to take off from the terrace of your house... flying at 3000 feet above air..land at a patch of grass or gas station 300 Kms away .. fuel it up ..and you are ready to take off again!!..Sounds like a james bond meets indiana jones scenario?...well , welcome to the present- Its real!!

The perfect trip?.... Travel around africa with just a backpack and a paramotor. Fly around the continent and enjoy the scenery from the air landing in an area which might look interesting from the air.

Ill tell you how the trip went in 2010..!!

I technically dont have a license to fly the microlight but i am nearly there to have enough hours which would allow me to fly solo... just waiting to get enough time and moolah to clock flying hours for the coveted license

Besides the paramotor, flying in the X-air microlights is always awesome... Its definitely not as free and liberating as a paramotor but the feel of the control stick accompanies a mind numbing adrenaline rush, which very few other things can provide.

Watching a crimson sunset in the Horizon on a warm evening while you gently glide the plane down on the runway is a truly divine feeling...














Can the magic of flight ever be carried by words? I think not.