RMK

They are OK with either USPA or BPA membership; give them a call on +34 9 72 45 01 11. Very friendly place; IMO, best dropzone in Europe. There’s always other British jumper there along with some British coaches. As said above, landing area is long and narrow, however the wind in nearly always in either of the “long” directions. One point to note for new jumpers is that the jump run is always the same direction South to North (sea to mountains) so on a windier day with wind out of the south; you could be quite deep since with 25+ jumps you’ll be near last out of a 20 person Twin Otter. So maybe opt for one of the Pilatus loads as you’ll always have a good spot with 9 people or less on the lift. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

A Sabre2 190 was my first canopy (I weigh 190) and I started jumping it with less than 40 jumps. This has been great for me and is a canopy with a quite wide envelope, so you won’t outgrow it overnight. I did take a canopy course before flying it and dropped down in stages from student 240 to 190. My experience has been good and I highly recommend the canopy. However, as for your specific abilities; refer to your local coaches and maybe have a look through this forum (there is much discussion/advice on experience & jump numbers on this forum which you can search) "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

This thread reminded me (I had the same thought of posting a good word on L&B). I recently had a problem; called and spoke with Mads Larsen himself who immediately took care of it and was very helpful and professional. I have an AltiTrack on my wrist and an Optima in each ear and would gladly buy anything else this company produced. Top marks to L&B "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

Try to gauge the person you are speaking with, then decide if it should be dropped into the conversation. If you don't have the ability to "read" people, you are not going to go far in your occupation anyhow. After 30-60 mins speaking with someone, you should have a rough feel if they are the type of person that would find it interesting to know that you possibly have a 5 golf handicap, can kayak class 5 rapids or even skydive. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

I didn’t add the bullet point “have full insurance coverage for all your equipment”. If travelling around with a few thousands worth of equipment, it is only reasonable to assume you have insurance cover; however it’s your choice if you choose not. Remember, gear can also go missing from autos, DZs, hotel rooms, storage locations etc. An airline isn’t the only way you can lose your rig/equipment. Please note that this is an international forum. Yes, I am fully covered with no deductible, but this is for my policy in my country. No one on here can speak for every country and every insurer. WTF, from reading these forums, it seems there’s an assumption that everyone in the US uses the same home insurer with the same coverage? "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

If this thread is about travelling with skydiving gear (below are some comments). If it’s about attention seeking when you are getting from point A to pointB, I have no comment; it’s just sad. These notes are about international travel (not just US domestic). 1. Don’t draw unneeded attention to yourself/equipment 2. Check your rig in a suit case as sports equipment with NO external identifiers (i.e. no visible skydiving decals/stickers) 3. Have a copy of AAD Card or Airtec Letter (though I have never been asked to see either) 4. Never tie anything around the handles etc of your rig I don’t have the highest jump numbers or years of jumping on this forum, but I have travelled with my gear to multiple countries on 5 differing continents using everything from First Class majors airlines to crappy budget airlines (i.e. Ryanair). I’ve never seen anyone following the above to have a problem; all problems I have personally seen are from people trying to carry gear onboard in some manner. Yes, you can argue that your suitcase can get lost. But, be realistic this doesn’t exactly happen on each and every flight does it? Besides your insurance company will buy you a new on new one. What about jumping when you arrive on this hypothetical trip? It’s not exactly like the majority of people on this forum are on the PD Display Team. Rent. In short, check it & shut the fuck up. It works. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

I don’t know your experiences with them, but the USPA seems quite helpful and professional particularly in comparison to the BPA (I’m a member of both). Personally, I don’t begrudge them USD 58.00/yr when I have to pay GBP 140.65 for my BPA membership. These come due in April of each year and this past year we saw an exchange rate of 1.99 making the 2008 BPA membership 279.89 US Dollars equivalent. 58 Bucks doesn’t sound so bad now. To add some salt in the wound (re BPA), let’s say you already pay a substantial sum for a third party insurance that has global coverage for skydiving and liability cover of GBP 2 million. Think the BPA would allow you to opt out of the insurance portion as you are already covered? No chance. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

Excellent point and I 100% agree on your note to only ever use the chest strap to wrap/tie a rig. There's been more than one nasty incident of people using ribbon/tape/cords and then forgetting to take them off before jumping. However, regarding the note of not checking it as baggage I disagree. I have flown with my rig to varying countries on 5 different continents and have never carried it on. The only problems I’ve witnessed were where people where insistent on carrying rigs onboard. Of course use proper locked luggage, not soft bags. Having a separate bag with just the rig, will usually get you flat-rate “sports equipment” pricing as opposed to paying by the kilo. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

This is but one of many interesting hobbies. Several of the prior posts seem to take this a bit too seriously. If you intend to list your hobbies/interests why would you exclude skydiving if it’s one of your activities? Whenever I interview people, I always end with “tell me a little about yourself and what you do?” I like to think that I’m an interesting person and my wish is that so are the people I work with. If “enjoys walking & reading in my spare time” is the extent to which you enrich your personal life; what are you bringing to your professional endeavours? I regularly jump with colleagues and friends from the financial sector and have, over prior years, met other jumpers with occupations as diverse as surgeons, judges, physicists, etc. The stereotype that all skydivers have long hair, tattoos and live in VW vans is beginning to become a bit outdated and serving the sport’s image no real benefit. You’d be surprised to know the number of professional people in our sport that effectively “dress down” to fit in. Granted your average dropzone demographics are quite dissimilar to those of a golf or yacht club, but neither is it truly a hippie commune of adrenaline junkies. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

As an alternate idea, you could plan it into (or make it) your next holiday. This isn’t a foreign exchange forum, but there have been some big currency moves in favour of the US dollar. The perennially feeble “greenback” is instantly worth more in quite a few countries. For example, when I did my AFF in 2002, the South African Rand was at record lows against the British Pound. Result: I got my full AFF for £440 when it would have been around £1500 in the UK - and had a nice holiday to add to it. However, be careful that the training will be accepted in your home country when you return. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

Was there ever a clean global copy of the kmz (Google Earth file) from this prior project? By clean I mean, just the location only, not 10-12 location pinpoints noting everything from the packing mat area location to the car park. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

Very interested in a Vegas Pro webinar. If you do it, please time it so that Europeans can take part. I’d gladly pay. I’ve got your VASST DVDs, but still have loads of queries as I’ve started off in Vegas Pro8 as a video newby. I’m IT proficient but totally new to video editing. I guess they assume anyone paying £400 for a software package is already fairly knowledgeable about video editing. Actually, I had to Google what NLE meant. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

I curiously clicked on this thinking hip was a synonymn for “trendy”. Damn, we’re actually discussing actual hips. Since the new hip is artificial, shouldn’t this be in “gear & rigging”. Where’s moderator Billvon or Quade? You guys sleeping? "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

loosen the strap and then fold it under the camera. Where you have padding under the the camera, remove the right side and let the strap serve as padding. They're expensive cameras; I wouldn't ruin it and render it unusable outside of your helmet. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

You’re an embarrassment; you’re a cheap bastard and proud of it? That’s why we have the poorest customer service in the UK of any major country and a British accent is greeted by disdain in restaurants around the globe. Why do you even comment on packers? In the UK they don’t exist. At least not in the conventional sense as seen at many international dropzones. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

I’ve got the TonFly CC1 and am very pleased. I think they’re the best made helmets on the market (cost aside). I’ve used it with both side and top mount cameras. Attached is a pic with the box for Sony CX6. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

CX12 is the same size as CX7 EXCEPT for the CX12 having an external manual knob on the front at about 5 o'clock under the lens. Same applie sofr Euro variants CX11/CX6. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

The PAC750 XL airframe/power plant is actually a Kiwi crop duster. It’s a utility plane, hence the idea to tweak a few things and sell it as a skydiver specific aircraft. No, it wasn’t designed from the drawing board with skydiving in mind, but it gets the job done in an economical fashion. It’s a rare occurance when someone makes a specialist product for our minority sport; I think it’s pretty good. Skydance use theirs for the twice-yearly HALOs from 30K. Tight cabin? Not as room as a Twin Otter, but I don’t believe much difference from a King Air. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

Regarding FS & FF, this is a norm at most DZs, but FS and FF order should be reversed if the jump run is downwind (such as at DZs that are near water and always have to have the same jump run). The slower the fall rate, the more time the wind speed has to affect you. A solo FS is at 120mph, whereas a bigger way may be 105ish. A solo FF going head down will easily fall through the vertical level of a larger FS group in front of him, so what is most important is whether that group is getting closer or farther from you on the jump run due to wind. It’s damn annoying, if you end up having to spend your FF jump watching the FS group in front of you gradually getting closer to you both vertically and horizontally, just due to jump politics in regards of who is on the lift. At many drops zones, this has or is now changing and FS is the new bastard child with jump order at the preference of the FF jumpers. However, the deciding factor should always be the WIND, not who’s on the load. For no wind days, I don’t see any argument as to why FF should not go before FS. A sit flyer could fall on the head of a flat flyer, but not the other way around. To conclude my ranting, I’ve got a virtual “Bitch Slap” for people still using the outdated term “relative work”. OK, you’ve jumped since the 70s we get it. What other fun event is described as work? "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

I’ve owned my own rig and could pack well from jump #20, but I fully agree with the prior post – packing is not fun (it is shit and I have no problem with paying). What’s so damn enjoyable or noteworthy about rolling around on the floor with your rig for 15mins after each jump? Do 8 jumps and that’s 2 hours pissed away. I only pack when the UK (because we don’t have dedicated packers at any dropzone I’ve ever frequented). When I travel, I have never packed my own rig. This UK practice just helps take business away from our home dropzones. Example: today was a beautiful warm blue sky day in the UK and I would have loved to go jump, but I thought why bother? I’ll just wait for my trip to Spain next week and get in some “enjoyable” jumping. Our home dropzones don’t get it; some of the skydiving community actually does have a little money and wants to have fun. If we don’t get it here, we’ll go aboard. I’ve met about 30-40 UK-based skydivers who have never jumped in the UK ??? (they think what’s the point?). For those outside the UK - support your packers it just may help some kid get into the sport and enjoy it the same as we do. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

Thanks. I have converted my library, but thus far only about 15% of my songs have an update on iTunes. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

Many people burn their iTunes songs to disc, rip them and then copy them into their video editing projects (for Apple .M4p files, the .M4a files work OK in Sony Vegas already). Much easier, I’ve found some software that “virtually” burns the songs to a folder called “TuneClone” at www.tuneclone.com This is not meant to promote illegally copying songs, but allows you to use your already purchased songs for private projects. I’ve been looking for something like this; hope it helps others. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

At about jump #22, I was on rented gear and went out to manifest with the wrong rig on. Luckily some “jobsworth” sent me back to the hangar because I didn’t have the packing card which was required at that DZ. Glad to have not found out how much smaller the canopy was than the 240 I was expecting. Beware new jumpers, a row of same colour rental Javelins can catch you out. And I must admit, I also did the newbie one of getting on the plane without my helmet (to the displeasure of the other waiting jumpers) "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

No, No not Pinnacle Studio; if I could ever reach throgh the phone line and bitchslap someone it would be Pinnacle Technical Support. I had several versions (9,10 & 11) and have finally given up on the company. They're giving the storyline that all the "problems" are fixed in V12, but I wouldn't gamble on that one. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"

That was great! He did a big banked turn under wing at the English coast then a couple spirals under canopy. National Geographic Channel is showing it again at 19:30 UK time. Great job. "Pain is the best instructor, but no one wants to attend his classes"