Navigating India: Eddie Colfox

Aninder: But when we arrived, the first year we arrived, we all started doing that kind of thing. And Jim and I flew to Manali pretty much the first day I arrived. Jim was raring to go, but he was wanting to go with someone else. Be very careful of the cloud. If you see someone else there, don't necessarily follow them. There are some amazing pilots in there, and there's some idiots. Well, there's some people that just don't know what they're doing, is what I mean. I don't mean it rudely. Well, there was one time I can pick up John in this one as well, which is nice. There was

one time, I think it was the first time that anyone had ever landed in Barabangal. And it was me and John and a load of other very good pilots, Jim Mallinson, Mike Blubb, Mike Langle, Manny Langle, Antoine Lorenz. Who else was there? There are a load of very good pilots and I hope I haven't missed anyone out. And we all set off to go to Barabangal.

Eddie Colfox: In the north of India, you'll find an unusual quirk of geology.

A mountainous plateau pushed up by the continental crash of tectonic plates that created the grandest mountain range in the world. It is noteworthy to mention that you have missed out on one of the most incredible places to fly that our planet has to offer until you have taken the pilgrimage to this mecca of paragliding. The flying site in focus today is a part of the mountain range which is about 2,300 km long and it has an average elevation of more than 6,100 meters. Let that sink in.

It extends in south-eastwards direction across the northern regions of India and Pakistan before purely turning east, where it is flanked by Nepal and the southern Tibetan Autonomous Region of China at various points of mergers.

It's a land of griffon vultures, Hindu temples, mouth- watering and sometimes belly-altering vegetarian delicacies. And not to forget, the occasional cumulo nimba is surrounded by breathtaking ranges of all shapes and sizes. ranging from a humble 500 meter altitude foothills to gigantic six to seven thousand meter peaks. And twice a year these majestic lands open up their weather systems to allow us to open up our canopies and soar along to great heights as we practice the art of flight through one of the biggest playgrounds that our planet has to offer for our sport of paragliding. The mighty Himalayas. Their name quite literally means the adobe of snow. It is the last frontier, the

king of all mountains. Here species have thrived and gone extinct. Civilizations came and then destroyed. But these mountains, they have seen it all. As air flows over northern India's hot steaming plains, it's like they're passing through a sauna. The clouds soak up the steaming moisture as it hits the steep slopes, where they're squeezed through narrow gaps in the hills until last bit of hot air climbs up to the cloud base. And this is what makes it such a perfect place to touch the sky with glory. So strap in securely, check your reserve handles and tune your radio frequencies for we are going to soar high and far as I, along with my guests for the day, take you across an audio guide through all

that you need to know to navigate the skies of Northern India as we begin our quest to touch the sky with glory in Birbilling.

So, when B was starting to attract flyers from across the globe in its early days, there was a small group of men hungry to chase some great adventures over these wondrous lands, pushing the limits of altitudes and distances while pioneering world-be-back flying, much before the hike-and-fly genre as we know it today was ever invented. They roamed and soared across the mountain ranges all the way to Nepal and back with their record-breaking journeys in the Himalayan skies. And today, to help us navigate the skies of beer, we have one of them with us, Eddie Colfox. So let's dive right in and listen to Eddie's perspective for when it comes to touching the sky with glory and beer.

Well, so Eddie, one thing which I'm pretty sure all our listeners will be super curious about is that what does beer mean for you? Like for someone who has seen it grow since day number one, when the word beer comes to your mind, what rings a bell? Well, Birya has been in my life a lot since about

Aninder: 2006. But it's always been there because I did a lot of paragliding in the 90s in India. in Maharashtra, and we were always talking about beer. I met Bruce Mills and Debbie Chowdhury and Gilles Monnier. They were all flying a lot, and I met them down in Maharashtra in Goa in 96. So it's always been, I was being there for a long time. I started flying in 92, so quite early on in my flying career, I was flying in India, and beer was always a really well-known place. Although not that frequented, but I know that Xavier Ramon did something there in the very early 90s, I

think. And there were hang gliding competitions there in the late 80s and stuff. And I knew some people who competed in those hang gliding competitions. So it was on my radar. And then, of course, I knew John and Bob Drury when they did their long trip from Darumsala. They went towards Nepal back in 96 or 97. So I knew about it, but I hadn't been there. So it was very exciting to finally go there and fly there in 96. Not 96, 2006. And Bob wrote some amazing articles, which you probably can dig out of Cross Country magazine back then. They definitely put it on the map for me. And then I've got a great friend, Jim Mallinson, who I do a lot of flying with and was part of Himalayan Sky Safaris. He's a Sanskrit

scholar and a paraglider pilot. He'd been going to India and flying in India. And we are great friends. I'm really old friends with his wife. And so we've known each other a long time. And so that, of course, the conversation was always out there. And John Sylvester, he's a great mate. Unfortunately, he was a great mate. And we used to go to competitions together. John and I went to try and fly the Nanda Devi area in 2006. And we went there in September and found the conditions very unmanageable at that time. And I've always been a bit more chicken than John. John was always much braver than me. And so I did 10 days or something in and around Josimut. you know in that area trying to fly and

after climbing out of two gorges i thought stuff this i'd had enough you know it's two very scary landings and so on so i so i headed back i headed over to beer and had a fantastic time and realized that it was very accessible very good flying and so i started running trips there from from the following year from 2007 with jim and john

Eddie Colfox: So basically, when we talk about early 2000s and when manufacturers were still experimenting with the canopies and the equipment was still not as streamlined as it is today, or what is available to the newbie pilots who are learning, spreading their wings in beer in first 50 or 100 hours. I mean, John and Bob had been exploring this for quite a while. How exactly was it to logistically to go ahead and fly this place and take it from there on? Well, I think the thing is, I mean, John and I had been flying in the Karakoram as well, preceding going to beer. And the thing

Aninder: about the Karakoram was it was, you know, it was a much bigger expedition and it was, the conditions were much stronger. And it wasn't so easy to get to, et cetera, et cetera. In terms of the wings, the wings are always improving. And back then, Xavier Raymond had the world return record. He did an 80-kilometer. I think he did Dharamsala Bir and back. Robin and Bir, Dharamsala and back. You know, he did that. I think he did that, you know, back in 88. So the... The winds haven't held us back. It's been the mind that's held you back. As I say, John and I had just returned from

Pakistan, where we'd done some great big flights, you know. I'd done a couple of 200-kilometer flights following the highway, and John had done a 180-kilometer flight not going miles and miles and miles away from the highway. I think what I'm trying to say without sounding arrogant, but not meaning to be so, is that we arrived with a different headset. You know, John had already done his Vogue paperwork along with Bob Jory, along the Indian Himalayan chain. And we'd both come back from the Karakoram having done some big stuff there. Whereas the guys, the pilots who were regularly flying beer at that time, had sensibly just kept to the front ridge and done some lovely flights, but not really

dipped back. I think two people had flown to Manali. But when we arrived, the first year we arrived, we all started doing that kind of thing. And Jim and I flew to Manali pretty much the first day I arrived. So Jim was raring to go, but he was wanting to go with someone else. And I think the attitude was that there weren't that many people who were prepared to. They were having a great time flying beer and flying the front range. They weren't dipping into the back. So Jim and I pretty much the first day we arrived arrived. We landed in Kulu. Jim had landed in Kulu before.

Yeah, and he'd had a nightmare. One of the people that he'd done it with had hurt himself and so on. And yeah, so I think we just helped people open their eyes as to what was possible. I think I was the first person to land at Parasa. I don't want to claim too many firsts and I don't want to claim them for other people because it suddenly burgeoned around that date. You know, we all go around 2007. Yeah. Just to backtrack a little bit,

Eddie Colfox: there's a very fascinating story which comes to my mind that you guys had already been exploring Karakoram, which is like kind of more exposed terrain than what Himalayas are offering, at least in the front range in Birr. And how developed was the sport at that point of time, where it was possible for two pilots like you to just come up from Europe, bring in all your expertise and enthusiasm to this side of the world without any logistical support, and just go out there and chase these crazy adventures in big mountains? How was it doing all of these by yourself back then? The equipment was nothing like as good as it is now. You know, the glide on the wings in 94 was sort of 1 to 6, 1 to that kind of thing, 1 to 7

Aninder: maybe. We were already in the UK, a tiny little wet, windy country, surrounded by sea. We'd already done almost a 100-kilometer flight. And as I say, Xavier Ramond had done an 85-kilometer out and return at Birr itself. So it wasn't the equipment holding us back, it was our heads. And it was just about going out there and being brave enough to do it. Brave, stupid enough or whatever adjective you put in front of it. I see. You know, it was just about opening our eyes and knowing what was possible and being prepared to give it a go. And how was it to do that? Yeah, it was brave. Brave and foolish or, you know, it was just exciting. I've done it, you know, I've done it as a pioneer pilot. but I've always

Aninder: kept some basic principles around me of knowing you know knowing where I can run to basically having some idea where I might be able to escape and I took that kind of principle to the Himalaya and of course I made sure I tried to always do it with some brilliant people and I was very lucky in that I did it a lot with John and Jim and and others Debu and Antoine and Mike and the great, you know, there's a list of fantastic pilots that I was lucky enough to fly with. And I still do. That's good to hear. So I think if there's a budding pilot listening to this, the key is to

Eddie Colfox: basically surround yourself with people that you look up to and that are pushing the boundaries within the safety envelope and still trying to chase the dreams by going outside the comfort zone, surrounded by the ones who have been doing it for a while. The main things I would tell to

Aninder: young pilots flying in an area like that is to always let your friends know what your plans are. Use the equipment that you have available. I know India's tricky with some of these satellite communicators and stuff, but if you have some form of tracking device, try and buddy fly if you can. Try and fly with a mate. Let people know, you know, let people know your plans in the day. Let someone know that, you know, group up with people. Let people know that you've landed in the evening. Yeah. You know, don't be arrogant. You don't need a great wing out there. Remember, people have flown there for 30 years and they've done big flights there since, you know, since 1988, which is ages ago. So you

don't need the best equipment. You need good equipment that you feel comfortable on. you can relax with enjoy it take a photograph don't fly a wing you're too scared to take a photo on It's that kind of thing that I would advise people. And be aware of where you are. Be very careful of the cloud. If you see someone else there, don't necessarily follow them. There are some amazing pilots in there, and there's some idiots. Well, there's some people that just don't know what they're doing, is what I mean. I don't mean it rudely. But, you know, because someone else is there doesn't mean it's the right place to be necessarily. Yeah. Fly with a radio, if you can, and a transmitter, you know, so that you can get

rescued. Yeah, indeed. And I think you made a very important point that fly a wing that you can take a photo on. If that feels secure, then the

Eddie Colfox: flying should come naturally and easily after that. And do be very careful of the cloud. Many of the accidents happen because of the cloud. Indeed. Just to touch up a bit further on the flying conditions in Be Ready, have you seen any change or any evolution in the way the weather systems have been coming or the flying conditions have been evolving over the past period of 20 years, like what you looked at? in the beginning, how it was back in 2000s and what is it now after a couple of decades? Yeah, I do genuinely think that the seasons are getting later.

Aninder: And I would say, yeah, the rainy season has been pushed back. When I first came, late September was good. And now it seems to be more like from the 10th of October. I see. When it comes to glider handling or any of those things in the condition, has that evolved over a period of time that now

Eddie Colfox: you need to handle it a bit more or the air is a bit more rougher and the systems have to work a bit more harder than what you used to earlier with the change in climate and weather systems? Well, no, my experience, but this is very anecdotal. I haven't sort of looked at this statistically.

Aninder: Beer, you know, it's a short season, isn't it? Between the too much stability of the instability in the monsoon to then it becoming too stable in the winter. And that used to happen in my experience in late September that the monsoon would recede enough that you had a good flying day there. But then by... By the end of October, it was getting too stable to get above about 2,800 meters. But my experience is that everything has stepped back. And in fact, the monsoon hasn't properly gone away until the first week or so of October. And actually, it's unstable enough to get up well over 3,000 meters right the way into November now. Indeed. You know, I left this year, I left on about the 15th

of November and I was at 3,600 meters on the front ridge and 5,800 meters deep in the back. That wouldn't have happened. You wouldn't have got to 5,800 meters deep in the back in mid-November. In the mid- 2000s, you know, in 2008. As far as I remember, that wasn't being done at that time in the season at all. it was often far too hard to even get to 2,600, 700. I see. So definitely we are noticing a bit of a climate change pattern

Eddie Colfox: here, which also brings us to a point that it's even more important to think about climate change and how we are having an impact on the planet as a whole. Yeah, there seems to be an effect of climate change, definitely. I think the inversions are thicker and blacker than they

Aninder: normally are. You know, I remember there was one PWC where we camped over the back. And the following day, the PWC people were flying in the smog. And we were flying in the back and it was beautifully blue. But we could see like a... It was like something off a film set. You know, we could see this sort of... murk which was stopped by the dayadar and it literally was standing a couple hundred meters above the dayadar and was trickling over the front you know trickling over the dayadar into the back and the back was beautifully blue and crisp and the front was hot wet sticky and smoggy I think that the scene that you're narrating right now is a pretty common scene over here. I fully agree that inversions are

Eddie Colfox: thicker, grayer, and darker. Especially in the evenings, when everything starts to settle down, it's a very thick blanket of cloud. Yeah, true. Well, when we talk about flying conditions between front ridge and back ridge, Eddie, let's say you're a pilot coming into India, and this is one of your first flights, although you, Bob and John, have been smashing it since day one, ever since you arrived, because you had a bit of a skill set. What is the safe yet adventurous way to navigate your first few days? I mean, let's call them acclimatization days, right? So while you're still trying to get to know the terrain, while you're still trying to find your footing, how do you recommend a pilot coming in? With

about 100 to 300 hours under its belt, intermediate pilot flying a beehive wing comes in on the takeoff. What should be the game plan usually, which is a safe yet adventurous one? Well, ideally be fit and healthy. Make sure you've slept well. Make sure you've had a day or two to

Aninder: acclimatize. Go for a long walk high up. Make sure you're really good at the launch. You know that you've got to... It's a very light wind launch normally. So you've got to be good at doing either an alpine or a moving reverse launch. You've got to keep yourself... You don't want the wing to tuck just before you launch because then you roll down the face. And if you're using the lower launch, that's really quite dangerous. So you've got to get the airspeed over... You've got to get the wing... flying. So you've got to be prepared to run off quickly. It's a crucial, crucial thing. You've got to be prepared to move forward during the launch so that the wing doesn't overfly you. And you've got to be in it. So

you've got to make sure, you've got to make sure that you're very good on checking everything can beam and being confident enough to do that SNAP launch. Because it is a tricky launch, particularly on the Lower West launch. So other things to recommend, you know, talk to people. Find out what's done. Look at XC Contest. See the track logs that people have put up. Take note of what time of day the clouds form. If they formed very early in the day, the chances are it's going to get very big at some stage. You know, be aware of that. The forecast in saying that is also getting

much, much better. I would recommend, to be frank, you know, I'm going to say this. If you're someone that's involved in the sport, you've probably got some spare cash. Pay an experienced guide. Be part of a group. Not only do you learn to fly a lot more, you get... You know, you get more bang for your buck, you know, in terms of all the time and energy you put into flying. If you take an experienced person with you, he will ensure or she will ensure that you get five hours a day instead of two. And those five hours will mean that, you know, you'll cover more ground.

You'll learn a lot more and you'll experience more flight. So, you know, it's, it's usually worth, it's worth the money. It's also much safer because you're part of a group. So that's, you know, that's my main thing I'd say to us, you know, that's a low airtime pilot as far as I'm concerned, a hundred to 300 hour pilot is he's, he's, he's only a beginner really. Um, and so I'd suggest that he gets himself involved in a big, in a group with lots of experience and share and, and use that as a resource to share all the experience of all the other pilots. And low airtime people, they do have a lot to say as well. You can listen to their experiences and gain from that as well. Indeed. Right now, we've talked

Eddie Colfox: about launch and trying to navigate safely the overall perspective. But let's say if a pilot wants to try and head towards, like there are a number of lines which can be flown to the right of the takeoff, to the left of the takeoff, and of course the magnificent back mountains and the way to Kulu and everything. But when you're looking at a two, three-hour day with an average cloud base of, let's say, somewhere around 3,500, What's the most safest route to possibly navigate with a lot of landing options and which kind of gets you high and keeps you high kind of a thing that you would recommend from your experience of flying in this region? Okay, with a 3,500-meter base, I mean, I'm assuming you're saying

Aninder: that's the base on the front range, on the Dayadar themselves. That is correct, yeah. That's a bit too low, unfortunately, to do the high dayada, although you could probably do the start of it. But basically, in that kind of day, if you're the kind of pilot you've just suggested, I would fly westward and I would try and go to Dharamsala and back. And if I managed to go to Dharamsala and back, I would try to go to Dharamsala and 360 and back. We're a bit short of 360, a bit, you know, a little bit to the west of 360. So, you know, to, to sort of Jiginda now going back. That way

you've always got some decent landings in mind. You've got, you've got enough elevation to get away from any big clouds. If the clouds are big, you can make sure that there aren't mountains around them. If you don't, I mean, you can run out to the south, which will keep you away from the mountains. You don't want to have 3000 meter clouds in a, you know, in a, in a, in a valley system because you can get trapped. Yeah. I would essentially head to the west and you've got huge bomb outs and easy retrieves. Yeah. I'd be very, the other thing, low airtime pilots, cautious of terraces. You know, get your landings right. Know that you can land in a small area. Indeed. You know, people do some crazy thing

with how they land on terraces. Indeed. Sometimes you get people landing upslope on a terrace, which of course is terribly dangerous. And sometimes if you land downslope on a terrace, you never actually come down because there's so much lift around. So you have to treat a terrace slightly like a slope landing if you want to be confident of not hitting the power lines, which of course you need to keep a great lookout when you're coming in to land anywhere. The main dangers for landing are terraces and power lines. Indeed, and I think I can agree on that because

Eddie Colfox: one thing we should mention for our listeners is that this whole front ridge of Dalazar is infested with power lines everywhere. Primarily because there's a lot of inhabitation in this side of India and all of these landings will have power lines around them. So make sure, I think it's very wise to pick out your landing well in advance at least 300, 400 meters above ground level, while you might still be sniffing out the lost terminals and hoping to make your way back to the main LZ. But a terrace landing, power lines, and some trees are essential to be kept in mind, I believe. Well done. I agree with you entirely. I mean, for European pilots, you bring out a good point. Choose early to make your

Aninder: decision to land in a country like India for the reasons that you just described. You know, being confident. It's a different being confident of finding a safe landing zone where there aren't terraces and pylons. Keep looking until your feet are literally on the ground, because small ones appear last minute that you haven't seen, sometimes strung between buildings and things. Don't choose to land too close to the main settlements, because as you say, there are power lines everywhere. Be prepared to land a little bit away from everything. Walking, there's nothing wrong with walking. For a UK pilot or for lots of European pilots, we will struggle trying to get low saves. All the way

to the ground, we'll be trying to get back up again. Whereas a pilot in India has to make a conscious decision quite early on to choose somewhere safe to land, as you said. Right. Well, I mean, now we have discussed a bit of a front ridge flying and what average decent day we'll

Eddie Colfox: look at with the possibility of coming to and fro from Dharamshala and going a bit eastwards as well if the day permits. In your opinion, and from all these years where you've seen, you've flown these lines yourself, when exactly do you think is a time for a pilot to jump back and try and start scratching the surface of what back has to offer? Well, I think that depends a huge amount on the pilot and who he's flying with,

Aninder: which group he is flying with, whether he's on a good guided trip or whether he's just acting alone. Also, what type of background they come from, whether they're mountain people, whether they understand the mountains. etc etc so it's hard to give a categorical answer for that but what i would say is that everything steps up by at least 30 percent when you go over the back so the altitude steps up thermal strength sets up and and so does the perceived roughness and the temperature as well it gets blooming cold and that's you know by more or less 30 percent you know by a third I mean, thermal strain probably doubles, to be honest. But I wouldn't do anything big for a while. If you are going to go over the back,

make sure you know where you're heading. Make sure you've got the right theory on where the thermals will trigger so you know you've got a confident climb. And then just get up to 4,000 or so and then fly back. But I mean, this sort of thing, I can't really describe exactly where the climb would be or where the... I'd like to do that in person using diagrams on a tour, ideally, on a book trip. But essentially, be confident of where your thermal trigger is, the height that you need after your first climb, the height that you need to set off, what the day's lapse rates are predicted to be, whether it's going to overdevelop and what time of day that you are that you're setting over to

glide over there and knowing the height at which you can glide back from and which the ideal routes are to glide back. And when people refer to the back, but the back is vast. It's all the way to K long and beyond if you really want to. summarize what someone with that kind of airtime should do before they go into the back. Well, if they're not on a guided trip, they should get themselves high enough on the front that they can confidently get the climb on the back. And then get to high enough on the back that they can confidently get back to the front. And not to go beyond

that until they've experienced that once or twice so that they know how rough it can be. But not to be too intimidated at the same time. Indeed, I think there is a retreat from the valley behind. Yeah, because there are bomb outlandings there now. There always have been. And now there's a road there as well. But the curious thing is that as soon as you jump out from the front ridge, there is a massive valley wind system that comes

Eddie Colfox: into play as well, which has to be taken into account, which is pretty much non-existent in the front one, I believe. Yeah, well, it's not true

Aninder: to say that it's totally non-existent in the front. But yeah, you're right. There's a significant difference between the valley winds in the back and the valley winds in the front. You do get valley winds in the front around Big Face and around Chamunda and around some of the ranges near Dharamsala. But in the back, yeah, the Bharat Valley, all of them have valley winds. They're not usually too strong, mind. You can get nasty shear levels in the back, depending on where you are as well. You can get changing wind directions. with altitude or with the air mixes with the various value systems. I'm sorry, I keep repeating this, but I do think it's worth paying for Guy. Or, you know, you're just doing

things within your own parameters. You know, be confident of at least 80% of the things that you're doing. You know, if you don't know the area, you don't know the weather, and you don't know your equipment, you're 100% unconfident. You've got to know enough of the things. So you're only stretching yourself a little bit each time. Indeed, indeed. Now, just very quickly, I wanted to backtrack on the fact where you said that

Eddie Colfox: everything intensifies by about 30%. So let's say the glider handling or the requirement to handle the glider will go up by 30%. the oxygen and the air is getting thinner, so the energy that the body is spending to put in the work is obviously higher than what it was in the front. Is it safe to say that have some kind of supplemental oxygen just in case, or even if not required, it's still an asset which you would love to have once you're exposed to something as massive and to those elements, basically. Well, I don't fly there with oxygen. I'm not a medic, but I

Aninder: think that officially, if you're over 3,000 meters, you should be having supplemental oxygen. But personally, I don't think that's the case. I think that might be the case if you're doing hardcore climbing and exerting lots and lots of physical exercise. Paragliding isn't that physical, but it can be if it's your first time experience because you get so gripped. You know, that you breathe fast and your body's tense and so on. So I would say try to relax. Try to keep calm. Try to do it gentle. Try not to stress yourself out. Try not to push too hard too fast, as I was saying a moment ago. Take the time when you're doing the glide over to make sure that you're keeping yourself warm. You're zipping

everything up. You're putting on whichever gloves that you want to use when you're higher in the back. um make sure that you've tested those gloves somewhere in nice easy conditions so that you're confident to wear them in your brake handles etc etc try and do all those tests in a situation where you don't actually need them um so that it's easy and it's not stressy keep yeah keep the stress low keep the exposure as low low as you can so your body can cope by keeping yourself warm Have some water nearby so that if you're a little stressed, you can just take a little sip. If you're someone that needs to have lots of wheeze, to pee, make sure that you're set up so that that's easy. It's those sorts of

little comfort things that make the bigger thing easier. Indeed. And I think I just want to point in that while you might have your camelback up

Eddie Colfox: and functional, it often freezes as soon as you go back because the temperature is dipped so low that your water is almost frozen. So do take into account that you might need some insulation on your supplies and keep them accessible. That is a very important part. Yes. You don't want

Aninder: to push your parameters too fast. You want to be aware of what size the clouds are in the valley system next door to you. If that valley system, if that cloud system is going to come into your valley and create a strong katabatic gust front. You know, katabatic gust fronts do happen. If there's a storm going off in the neighboring valley, a katabatic gust front might come down. You need to be aware of that. Theoretically, you should always have enough altitude to glide Out to a roadhead. Be prepared to land up high and walk down. The most important thing is to survive the day. It's not to go as far as you can. It's to be able to do it again tomorrow. Indeed, as we say, live to fly another day. And I think

Eddie Colfox: that is most important when you plan to go back or you plan to experience what these mountains have offered. That makes sure you are able to come back and do it again rather than just doing it once. Yeah, that's right. When we're talking about landings or basically option B, in the front there are plenty of option Bs. They don't come with any strings attached. You can just land, take a retrieve back home. It's fairly easy and simple. But once you're back in those massive back-of- the-back mountains, The options are very limited and the speeds are much higher because the density is lower, the temperatures. I mean, the elements are just a lot more harsher. But usually, what can a person expect if

worst comes to worst and then you have to improvise and basically survival skills have to come into play? Can you describe a bit of a scenario that what you need to be up for and prepared for against if that happens?

Aninder: It does come back to the same sort of balance, doesn't it? It's about the risks that you are prepared to take and what you enjoy and what your ambitions are. I don't want to take a risk. I want to always come back. I want to be able to do it again tomorrow. I always fly with a reserve. In a place like that, I always try and fly with some sort of transmitter. I know they're not technically legal, some of them in India. So that's an essential piece of safety equipment as far as I'm concerned. My glider, why not have a lightweight wing? As we said earlier in the interview,

make sure you're flying something you're really comfortable on. Something that you've done an SIV on. And don't push yourself always to go too hard. Make sure you've always got a couple of spare options. Yeah. Just talking about the kitting with respect to harness, I mean, I, of

Eddie Colfox: course, understand gliders. Anyone flies whatever they fly in front. There's not much of a big difference, and that is what you fly all around the world. But, I mean, these days we have equipment which is becoming lighter and ridiculously, like, thin, and, you know, protections are, I mean, although the certifications are still justifying it, but we almost see people flying with paper-thin harnesses. Is there any supposed recommendation that once you jump over to those kind of terrain, have basic minimum this kind of protection? I mean, I love to fly with a comp harness just because they're so comfortable and they're so well padded at least. I mean, that's what it looks like. But usually,

what kind of equipment should you be comfortable in, considering that you might have to walk back as well but i mean is is landing safely a

Aninder: priority or is walking back easily a priority kind of a thing so if you can throw some light on this uh you can always leave your kit behind so i don't suppose you have to go as light as possible if it compromises the above you can always leave your kit behind stash it somewhere get someone to help you There's still normally someone around pretty soon. You'll find someone. You can just carry what you can carry and then you can find someone and go back and collect the other bit. Bring a bit of money with you so that that sort of situation can be dealt with. I fly with boots that

I can walk in that keep my feet warm when I'm flying and offer some ankle protection. I always fly with a helmet. It keeps my head warm. It protects me from a stupid landing. And I try to choose a good landing. My thing is all about flying again tomorrow. I see. That's a great

Eddie Colfox: takeaway. That bottom line is that you should be having a good time rather than just chasing the adventure for the sake of it and be kitted in something that you're more comfortable in, being in your own skin, rather than just doing it for the sake of it. Yeah. Before we proceed forward, is there any kind of takeaways from the Bir Manali route, which is on the bucket list of a lot of pilots? I mean, I think everyone who's landing in India has two main things to kind of check off. The first one is, of course, the more... more humble yet still incredibly beautiful and adventurous one, which is Bir Dharamshala, which everyone has been doing since ages, and then Bir Manali. And the reason why I'm asking you

this question is because, as you said in the beginning of the show, that you guys were the first one to just go ahead and do it. So, like, I mean, you eventually will have to go ahead and do it as a solo pilot as well. But, like, beards are, inshallah, we have covered up a lot of points and how the ecosystem revolves around this route. But Bir Manali is a more adventurous, more rewarding and supposedly more skillful route as well. So what does one expect and what does one need to be wary of? And how can one make this a success before moving on to something like Hanuman,

like the bigger mountains, like the much bigger mountains back in the back? Well, you want to be good enough to bust inversions. You want to be

Aninder: comfortable being cold. You want to know your route. You want to be comfortable about choosing an outlanding spot, bearing in mind valley winds. It would be nice to know what the Rotang wind is doing, because that affects where you want to land. So that's a valley wind basically

Eddie Colfox: coming in from a pass originating from a venturi, is that what you're saying? It's a downwind. It's a katabatic that comes over the Rotang

Aninder: pass, and it can create nasty rough air low down. It can make landing difficult and it can take you by surprise because it reverses all the logic. And around Kulu, it can get very windy. You want to have some local knowledge. You want to talk directly to lots of people who've done it themselves and people that fly regularly in Manali. Observation is the key. Once you're in the air, it's about knowing what to expect. The best information about telling you what to expect in the future is to see what's happening in the present and where it's happening. And is that likely to then occur where you are going? So you can see what the winds are doing higher up from the clouds, what the winds are doing lower down from

Aninder: the smoke on the ground, what's going on in the middle ground from the effects on the snow surface, from the effects on other gliders, effects on the birds, the effects on the visibility of the air, whether the inversion, whether the smoggy air is pushing into the valley and cutting the lift off, whether the Whether the clear mountain rotang wind is coming down, pushing the smoggy air away, etc. That kind of thing. You can do your investigation prior to the flight, knowing what the forecasts are, knowing what other people's plans are. But then you also want to see what's going, what's likely to happen. Right. The last minute forecast is the best forecast. So the last minute forecast is

when you're actually in the sky. Ah, I see. Thanks for clarification, because I was starting to wonder, should you just dish out your phone

Eddie Colfox: just before the flight and check what the... No, no. No, it's just observation. It's just seeing what's going on, what other people are

Aninder: achieving, what the birds are doing, what the air looks like, what the wind looks like. Indeed. I think just bottom line is it comes down to that

Eddie Colfox: make sure you connect with the right people and make sure you connect with people who are like-minded before you embark on adventures by yourself so that at least you have the know-how and knowledge about what to expect and what to put in the work for. Talking about observation, I have been a fierce believer in this and that the more you observe, the more peace you are at with yourself. And I think a lot of it comes down to how comfortable you are in your aircraft and in your harness and everything. And as you said in the beginning of the show, that if you're able to take a picture while flying the wing, then that pretty much means that you are very comfortable flying the wing. But just out of

curiosity, especially when you go back and everything is more demanding and more extreme and more kind of aggressive, How can you keep yourself more relaxed? Because obviously, when the expectations and the demands are higher from the elements around you, you just have to spend more energy to simply survive. So is there a takeaway or something to keep you more calmed down? I don't know. Some people have music. Some people have... extra warm clothing or being full or anything. But usually if you have to take away your mantra from 20 years of flying in this, what has kind of worked for you, which could be a useful takeaway for the other ones who are trying to chase the same dream? We'll look

Aninder: after the stuff that's within your control. Keeping warm, keeping a drink nearby, having some sweets or whatever that makes you comfy. You don't have to be concentrating all the time on the bits on the glides where you know that the air is going to be relatively stable. You can let go, shake your hands out, warm yourself up. Have a fiddle, as I said, have a pee if that helps. Indeed. Try not to be tense, basically. Try to let your body relax. I think that pretty much sums up how a pilot should navigate beer safely, yet in a much more fun way, where we have talked

Eddie Colfox: about the conditions in the front ridge and what are the possibilities offering to both east and west of takeoff, along with if you want to push the limit a bit, in the back mountains. But I think the takeaway so far from this is that first, know what you're doing, define the goals clearly, and B, have some sort of company which is trustworthy, which allows you to do these things in a safer manner and with some feedback, with some constructive feedback at the end of the day so that you're able to evaluate what you're into. I think that's a fair summary, yeah. Just

Aninder: add to it, be prepared to change your goals. Don't get obsessed by your goals. Have a safe goal. Have a brave goal if you want one. But have another option which you can be happy to take. Don't obsess. Yeah. Eddie, just before we close out further, I think a lot of people are

Eddie Colfox: fascinated by what you, Bob and Jan have been doing over there over the years. Just for the sake of storytelling, is there an episode or some kind of a flight or some narration that you would like to give to our listeners right now? Because But as I said, it's a tale of legends. And unfortunately, with John no longer us, everything is just in the story. So I think if we can give our listeners a perspective of one takeaway or something that is close to your heart, I think we'll be very thankful. Well, there was one time I can big up John in this one as well, which is

Aninder: nice. There was one time, I think it was the first time that anyone had ever landed in Barra, Bengal. And it was me and John and a load of other very good pilots, Jim Mallinson, Mike Blubb, Mike Langle, Manny Langle, Antoine Lorenz. Who else was there? There were a load of very good pilots, and I hope I haven't missed anyone out. And we all set off to go to Barabangal. There was an inversion, and the inversion was low in the front. I think we ended up leaving at sort of 2,000... 900

Aninder: or something like that. It's much higher than we've done it before. And then in the back, it was really hard to get over the watershed range, the back wall, they call it, that goes between Tumsa and the head of the Lahadi Valley. You know, the Barabangal Watershed, basically, the Baroque Barabangal Watershed. And we couldn't quite get it. We were all up there banging our heads on an inversion. 50 meters below the height of the watershed. And John decided... John managed to do it, basically. John managed to hang in there. He got close enough, but he managed to... You know, the inversion tends... If there's a tight inversion, it follows the topography. So it's lower out from the ridge than it is tight

into the ridge. And John managed to get in tight enough. He was brave enough, confident enough, and obviously good enough close enough to the ridge that he managed to just pop over it. None of the rest of us did. And we were all experts. Everyone was an expert. Wow, that's heavy. And John did, and he flew over, and he landed, and he was the first man into Barabangal, as far as I'm aware. That's the story. That's what I want to try and say. He was a hero with... I'm being all glamorous and romantic, but he was a hero with other heroes. He did it. No one resented it.

Everyone was happy for him. We had a lovely camp. We camped somewhere else. We had a nice time. We flew down the following day. Flew back the following day. John had to walk out through Barabangal, which is ahead of a scary walk. But my point is, the nice part of the story, the thing I wanted to share, which was, it bigs up John, it bigs us up in a way, and hopefully it keeps everyone else safe, is you don't have to do it. You can enjoy it without achieving your goals. Indeed, I think that's a beautiful takeaway that we all are chasing this beautiful art of flight

Eddie Colfox: and we have to celebrate not just our achievements, but also our fellow pilots' achievements. And as long as we are content with whatever is being given to us, I think we are managing to touch the sky with glory in a very successful manner in our own way. And we're going to get the

Aninder: opportunity to do it the next day too. That's the thing. You try too hard and it can go horribly wrong. I agree. I agree fully. So live to fly

Eddie Colfox: another day. I think that is something that we can take away from. I think on that note, Eddie, it's been a massive, incredible honour to connect with you. We have had a very healthy discussion of giving pilots flying into this territory what to look out for and what to expect. Of course, I think if people want to connect with you, they can look you up on internet. There's enough information available as soon as your name is popped in. What was the tour name, Sky Safari, if you may throw some light on that? We're called Himalayan Sky Safaris, but I also work with Debbie

Aninder: Chowdhury and I work with Sky Summits as well. Great. Perfect. Himalayan Sky Safaris, Debbie Chowdhury and Sky Summits are my medical folks. On that note, Eddie, thank you so much. And until next time, we hope to see you. Yeah, my pleasure. I hope to meet you this year.