Welcome to my blog about paragliding. Here you will find relevant information and reports. I have been writing regular posts in this blog since September 2022, all reports before that have been backdated.
Concept & Idea
Originally, the idea was to only publish flight reports on my blog. However, it soon turned out that, due to my intense interest in paragliding, my tendency to get to the bottom of things and my very good gliding training, I have more to tell than just flight reports.
The blog is deliberately designed to be as simple as possible, true to the motto “keep it simple”. This also reflects my personal attitude to life as a purist.
Expertise
I can’t claim to be particularly well versed in any particular area of paragliding. My strengths lie more in my general technical understanding. As a result, I believe that I can familiarise myself with new technical topics relatively quickly. In contrast, I find it difficult to report on emotions. That’s why I often use ChatGPT for this area. Posts created with the help of ChatGPT are labelled accordingly.
Here and there I have individual sections checked by ChatGPT for good wording. As the changes are mostly marginal, they are not labelled here.
Motivation
I think the biggest enemy of every blogger is their inner bastard. It’s not easy to get yourself up after a long day at work to write something for the blog. But one thing that motivates me is that you have to deal with the topics much more intensively than if you simply read an article in a trade magazine. I have also realised that certain topics are not or only rarely covered in magazines.
Name & Logo
Inspired by the cinema film Ad Astra (Latin: To the stars), I have named my blog Ad Nubes (Latin: To the clouds).
The logo shows a paraglider pilot flying towards a cloud above a mountain, in keeping with the Ad Nubes motto.
Disclaimer
The blog reflects my personal opinion, which is also the original purpose of a blog. Opinions are often very subjective. Therefore, you should not simply accept everything I write in the blog without checking it, but rather scrutinise it critically. Especially in situations where your physical integrity, your life or the lives of others are at stake, I appeal to your sense of responsibility. Under no circumstances can I take responsibility for your actions.
Copyright
I take meticulous care not to infringe any copyrights. Where I refer to a source, a corresponding reference is made in the text, stating the source. Quotations are shown in italics. Nobody is perfect – so please get in touch with me if I have inadvertently forgotten such references.
Finances
I work completely independently and am financed exclusively by donations or by publishing individual articles in the DHV magazine. So you can be sure that this blog truly reflects my opinion – without economic pressure. For the sake of transparency, I mention in the posts if I am exceptionally provided with a product free of charge. However, my main source of income remains my job at an energy supplier.
Support
If you find my blog useful, I would appreciate a small donation in recognition of my work. There are certainly good reasons to support me:
- To preserve my independence. I think you can see from my reviews in particular that I don’t mince my words and express myself critically.
- As a little motivational aid. As I have already described elsewhere here, the blogger’s biggest enemy is probably his inner bastard.
- I don’t want to make big money with the blog, but it should at least remain a zero-sum game
- I don’t want to plaster my blog with adverts or hide it behind a paywall. I think that the free exchange of knowledge is an important factor for safe flying, especially in our sport.
- As I am already an older student, I have experienced how the World Wide Web has grown from the very beginning. I was and still am fascinated by Wikipedia in particular. I want my blog to reflect this. My blog is also based on the Wiki principle in that you can also comment on the articles.
- I would like to develop this blog further over the next few years and it would be great if you would also support this.
- You’re simply giving me a sign: Yes, the blog is an added value for me and I would like it to develop further.
- Compared to what the hobby otherwise costs, a small donation should be feasible for you.
There are three ways to make a donation to me. One simple way is via Buy me a coffee:
Another via Paypal, presumably most people already have a Paypal account anyway. Choose to transfer to friends and family, otherwise you will have to pay fees to PayPal:
The third option is via my private bank account:
Oliver Thomä
IBAN: DE66 2004 1111 0210 4164 00
BIC: COBADEHDXXX
Thank you very much for your support.
Contact us
Write me an e-mail at email@adnubes.info if you have any questions or suggestions.
Comments
I would be delighted to receive comments from you under the respective post. These can also be questions, but also corrections or additions to the respective topic. As I am fascinated by Wikipedia and use it regularly, I would also like to see something similar implemented here. You won’t be able to edit the posts, but you can add to them and correct them if necessary.
As I receive a lot of spam comments, comments are only approved and published after I have checked them. Comments must not be immoral, must not contain advertising and must comply with legal requirements. Netiquette must be observed and comments should be written in German or English. If your comment does not fulfil these criteria, it will be deleted without consultation. Please contact me if, in your opinion, a comment has not been published without justification.
Articles
The articles are selected according to personal interests. Most of them are topics that are easy to research. Even though I prefer to write about technology, you will find articles of all kinds, from products (software and hardware), hike and fly, my flying adventures and do-it-yourself projects, aviation technology to lectures. I hope there’s something for you too. If not, please get in touch with me if you have a request for a new topic or interview.
Nobody is perfect, of course it can happen that a post is incorrect or incomplete in your opinion. Use the comment field below each post or my e-mail address to give your opinion.
In addition to my own experience, my sources of information include clubs, specialist magazines, forums, conversations with pilots, podcasts, YouTube and messenger groups.
Categories
The posts are each assigned to exactly one category, which can be accessed via the Category menu item. The posts in the blog are divided into the following categories:
Interviews
In the interview category you will find interesting topics with relevant experts who have special knowledge in their field. I try to conduct the interviews face-to-face or via video conference (Zoom). However, interviews via a messenger service (WhatsApp and the like) are also possible. The recorded audio file is then transcribed (i.e. converted from audio to text) using Microsoft 365. As we do not speak as we write and transcription does not work perfectly, an interview requires considerable reworking. The revised text is sent to the interviewee for correction and final approval.
The advantage for you is that the interviews have been cleared of filler words and errors have been corrected. You can search for information using the search function in the browser, which is not possible in the podcast. The disadvantage is of course the lack of emotion, which cannot be conveyed in the written word.
Flightreports & Areas
Flight reports about my micro-adventures that I experience in the air with the paraglider. The reports are organised as systematically as possible, as this makes it easier for me to write a report. I cut out photos from the video recordings of the actioncam. The reports are also published on the DHV-XC and XContest platforms, as I hope that they will remain there for a long time.
You will also find descriptions of the flying areas and my hike-and-fly adventures.
How To
As I like to test things out in practice, it makes sense to describe the how-to. The topics are wide-ranging, from “How do I call up NOTAMs?” to “How do I check the trim of a paraglider?”.
Know How
Background knowledge that I have built up over time or have to research. I benefit from my 30-year career (with interruptions) in motorless flying. But of course I also have to familiarise myself with new topics.
Tests & Reviews
As I like to test products, it makes sense to share my opinions on this blog. Reviews don’t just mean book reviews, but all kinds of products are scrutinised here.
Review & Outlook
At regular intervals (usually at the end of the month), I would like to provide an overview of the topics that have particularly stuck in my mind or deserve a special mention, as well as special events that are coming up in the next month.
Miscellaneous
All contributions that did not fit into any other category.
Tags
To make it easier to find articles, they are labelled with one or more self-explanatory keywords.
Follow me
You can follow me on social media in the following ways:
I post all posts and more on Instagram. I only publish the photo and the excerpt from the post. The complete post can then be accessed via the following link. Unfortunately, Instagram does not allow hyperlinks in the posts, so the link has to be inserted as text in the browser.
I often record my flight with an Insta360 action cam. But only in rare cases do I edit it into a video and publish it on YouTube.
There is no newsletter. All new posts are announced on WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram. Everyone should have one of these messengers installed on their smartphone. The advantages for you and me compared to the newsletter are
- No complicated registration process
- Data protection is guaranteed as I do not see any contact details
- Maintenance of e-mail lists is no longer necessary.
The following links lead to the groups and channels of my blog:
Speech
As is customary among paraglider pilots, I use the first name in the blog. If this bothers you, you have no choice but to accept it or leave the blog.
As a rule, I only use the male form on my blog for the sake of simplicity, but of course women and other people in between are also very welcome and should feel addressed.
Languages
I usually write the posts in German and use DeepL to translate them into English. In the beginning I had to correct a few things in the translation, but now DeepL works very well.
By using one of the most widely spoken languages in the world, my blog is accessed all over the world, from Alaska to New Zealand and from Chile to Siberia.
Web technology
My web host is All-inkl.com, which I am very happy with, as the website build is very fast. I use WordPress as my content management system and the Ocean WP theme.
About me
Aviator vita
My flying CV in a nutshell:
1995: Start of my gliding training in Laufenselden in the Taunus region
1997: Examination for the PPL-C, the gliding licence
2000: UL training with examination
2004: After 9 years of gliding, I sit in a glider for the last time
2008: Start of my paragliding training
2009: Paraglider pilot exam
Equipment
Cross-country flights
For cross-country flying I use the Advance Iota DLS paraglider with the Niviuk Arrow harness
Hike and Fly
For the occasional hike-and-fly I use the Ozone Ultralite 4 with Ozone Ozium 2.
