SkySchool's April 2012 Newsletter

The last few months have been very good. After returning from Nepal we ran 3 weeks of training courses in the UK and for the first 2 weeks the weather was absolutely amazing! Alex flew pretty much every day, both a Paramotor and a Paraglider, and nearly all of the 25 students managed to get airborne in one way or another. Alex is currently at Lake Garda, Italy doing some acro paragliding where he successfully completed his first vertical Infinity Tumble, the video of which can be found here. In order to become the first British pilot to perform the famous Infinity Tumbling maneuver he needs to complete 10 vertical turns, so watch this space! We are running 1 more UK course in Mere from the 1st - 6th May and still have slots available so contact us if you are interested. The courses in Spain kick off on 20th May and we are fully booked until the 3rd June. We currently have 4 weeks with availability from the 3rd June - 1st July. 

In July we are running 2 Paragliding courses in Organya and Kester is organizing the Rough Ride Bull Run, an off road motorbiking trip across the Pyrenees in time for the Pamplona Bull Run. We return to the UK in time to run 3 UK courses from the 14th August until 2nd September. We hope as many of you as possible can come and join in the fun this season; blue skies and safe landings!

SkySchool's March 2012 Newsletter

Well the European Winter has come to an end and Spring is here, which means we are returning to the UK in time for the Spring courses in Mere, Wiltshire. Alex visited Chile and Nepal for lots of Acro Paragliding, Rob returned to India for some Paragliding and then Brazil, and Kester went Paragliding in Venezuela. It's therefore fair to say we have all had a great winter!

The UK courses this Spring are almost fully booked and kick off on the 27th March and run until the 15th April. We then head to Spain and will be running six Paramotoring courses from the 20th May until the 1st July. This is followed by the first Paragliding course from the 1st - 8th July, then a Motorbike Trip across the Pyrenees in time for the Pamplona Bull Run, and finally the second Paragliding course from the 15th - 22nd July.

While in Nepal Alex was invited to support his friend Babu on the Red Bull X Alps in 2013. Babu and Lakpa won the National Geographic Adventurers of the Year award for their epic tandem flight from Mt Everest in 2011. Alex and Babu will be traveling in the Alps in late July and early August in order to recce the X Alps route from Salzberg to Monaco. Alex then returns to the UK in mid August to run 3 more Paramotoring courses in Mere. To stay in touch with us and see what we are up to follow SkySchool on Facebook!

January 2012 Newsletter

Happy New year everyone! 2011 ended on a good note for all of the SkySchool Team; Alex went to Chile for a month of acro Paragliding and ended up throwing his reserve twice, the footage of which can be seen here! Kester went to Venezuela and Rob escaped to India. We are now gearing up for 2012 and have plenty of plans:

Courses in the UK: April and August

This year is going to be slightly different as we are running 3 x UK courses over Easter in the UK from the 27th March to 15th April before heading over to Spain for May, June and July. This will be a good opportunity for those who can't make it to Spain to do some intensive training. We then return to the UK in August for 3 more weeks of training. Details and exact dates can be found here: http://www.skyschooluk.com/Courses/Paramotoring-Courses-UK/Paramotoring-Lessons-UK/

Courses in Spain: May, June and July

We will be in Spain for 3 months, 2 of which will be spent running Paramotoring courses from the 29th April until the 1st July. This is followed by a Paragliding course/trip for beginners right through to advanced pilots in Organya from the 1st - 8th July. For further information on the Paramotoring courses visit: http://www.skyschooluk.com/Courses/Paramotoring-Courses-Spain/Paramotoring-Lessons-Spain/

For further information on the Paragliding course visit: http://www.skyschooluk.com/courses/paragliding-lessons-spain/paragliding-courses-spain/

Off Road Motorbiking Tours: May, June and July

SkySchool's latest development for 2012 is the Off Road Motorbike Tours. We will have a small number of Honda XR 400s' and 250's as well as all necessary protective equipment in order to offer bespoke 1, 2, 3 and 6 day Tours of the eastern Pyrenees. Those of you who have visited us in Spain before already know what the location is like and will hopefully agree that the idea of Off Road Biking is a no brainer! For further information visit: http://www.skyschooluk.com/motorbike-tours/off-road-motorbiking-tours/

Flying and Biking Trips: July

This year SkySchool instructor Kester Haynes is organising the Rough Ride Bull Run which is an off Road Motorbiking Trip from the east to the west of Spain in time for the Pamplona Bull Run. The dates are 8th - 15th July. We will be providing a limited number of bikes and equipment for hire as well as a support vehicle for all personal kit, spares, tents etc. Anyone interested in coming on this trip should contact: kesterhaynes@yahoo.co.uk

We are then running a Paramotor Trip over the D Day beaches in France from the 26th - 30th July. For further information visit: http://www.skyschooluk.com/flying-trips/paramotor-battefield-tours/

We hope as many of you can join us on or several of courses and trips this year. We wish you all blue skies and safe landings for 2012.

SkySchool's November 2011 Newsletter

The 2011 European season is now over and the SkySchool Team have either returned home or headed to warmer climates. Alex is in Chile doing some Acro Paragliding with the world Acro champion Pal Takats, Kester is working for Parajet in Wiltshire and Rob is about to go Paragliding in India.

We are already making plans for 2012 and the big thing for next year are our Off Road Motorbike Tours in the Pyrenees. We are all very excited about this new development as they are an excellent addition, not only do we have the ideal location for off roading but also the weather is no longer our main concern! Further information about these tours and the 2012 dates are now on the website.

We have also finalised our 2012 Paramotoring course dates in the UK and Spain. This year we will be running some pre season training courses in Mere, Wiltshire from the end of March until mid April. We then head to Spain for the Spring season from May until July.

We hope you have a good winter and look forward to seeing you in 2012, until then safe landings!

SkySchool's September Newsletter

The Summer season in the UK for SkySchool ended in a fantastic way with over 20 students turning up on our last day of training in Mere on Monday 29th. The weather, although a little chilly, turned out to be pretty damn good for flying and allowed 15 of the 20 students to either Paraglide or Paramotor.

Alex and Rob then departed the UK in fine flyable weather on the 31st of August and set out on a 4 day Battlefield Tour. The Tour took in Dunkirk, Ypres, Messines Ridge, Vimy Ridge, The Somme and Verdun. The weather was truly amazing and Alex managed to fly at both Ypres and The Somme, where we managed to capture some great pictures and footage. We hope to do a similar Battlefield Tour next year after receiving so much positive feedback.

We are now in Spain and are running another Paragliding course in Organya before returning to Aerodromo Ordis for 6 more weeks of Paramotoring courses. Slots are still available in October so check out the website for further details. Until next time, blue skies and safe flying!

SkySchool's July 2011 Newsletter

SkySchool is now back in the UK after a great 3 months in Spain. The weather turned out to be very agreeable, most of the time, especially in June when we returned to Organya to run a Paragliding course. Unfortunately the French weather was not so agreeable and we had to cancel the D Day trip however we did manage to get a few great days of Paragliding in at the Dune de Pyla before the low pressure system moved in.

The UK courses kick off in Mere on the 9th of August and the first 2 weeks are already fully booked. There are still some slots available on the 3rd and final course from the 23rd -28th August. After the UK courses we return to Spain and will be running two Paragliding courses, one from the 11th - 18th September and the other from the 2nd - 9th October, both at Organya.

We will also be running six Paramotor courses in Spain from the 18th September to the 30th October and slots are still available. It looks like we will be returning to Nepal at the beginning of 2012 to run some Paragliding trips so anyone interested should contact us.

SkySchool's June 2011 Newsletter

We have been very busy over the past few weeks doing a lot of Paramotoring and Paragliding in some unusually warm weather! May got off to a good start when SkySchool MD Alex Ledger sat a private acro course at Lake Garda in Italy with world champion acro pilot Pal Takats. During the course Alex did his first ever tandem Paragliding flight as a passenger on Pal's unique 31m U-Turn Thriller which was a great experience. Footage of this flight and the rest of the course can be seen here.

May turned out to be a good month in Spain and even though the weather was not always perfect, we managed to do plenty of flying, especially at the beach where the sea breeze provided a nice laminar on shire wind making take offs very easy indeed. In the middle of May we headed inland to run a week of Paragliding training at Ager and Organya. The first two days were excellent and all six of us spent over an hour cruising the 15k cliffs at Ager right up until sunset. When the weather changed we decided to head to Organya which also allowed for plenty of flying and for Alex to practice the Acro maneuvers he had learnt with Pal.

We are all now back at Ordis and have just finished Paramotor course 5 which was a success. course 6 started today. The days are getting longer and warmer here and we have two more weeks of paramotor courses to run before we head back to Organya to run another week of Paragliding. The D Day trip has proven to be extremely popular however we still have a few slots available. UK courses kick off on the 9th August back in Mere so anyone keen for some UK flying should check out the website for more details.