Alan de Moura Morrison writes:
Hang gliding in Rio can be an exhilarating experience for both pilots and tourists - where else in the world can you take off in the middle of a big city, fly over the largest urban forest in the world and such beautiful and landmarks? Flights from Sao Conrado to the Christ statue and the Tijuca peak are the standard goals when the weather helps, but now the goal seems to have shifted somewhat. Long distance flying starting from a coastal site is not that usual, at least in this part of Brazil where the winds are typically not strong. Sunday morning conditions looked promising for the "run of the mill" good flight, so I took off at 08:30 and was headed to the Christ and Tijuca peaks! After hanging around with some fellow pilots at the Tijuca peak, we started a flying downwind. Let's see how far we can go! Two weeks ago the bar for cross country starting from Pedra Bonita was raised from just over 20km to 56 km by Nader Couri. The same Nader was now flying with me over the previous route. The weather was not perfect, some inversion was present and only a small amount of clouds popped up - no streeting, but also very little shade! After some three hours flying in the direction of Angra dos Reis, both of us ended up landing at Portobello after an 87km cross country by the sea side, granting spectacular views of the many bays that connect Rio and Angra. Cloud base was at 1500 meters. Just imagine what can be accomplished on a day with higher cloud base and some streeting? More pictures here and here and here and here and here. Cross country from Rio is just beginning!