For the next while, we will be operating Wings & Waves from Eva's house at 26 Beresford Street, Bayswater.

The double garage and the loft space above will be set up for office, service and sales. In the new years, we will be moving to new and very exciting premises. Watch this space!!

By popular demand, we are running another PG2 theory course, starting

Thursday, 3 October, 6.30pm at our loft in Bayswater.

This course is free for all Wings & Waves students and $20 per session for anyone else. If you are currently doing your PG2 or feel you need to brush up on your theory knowledge, please come in!

We will cover all aspects of PG theory which will prepare to become a competent paragliding pilot as well as prepare you for the PG2 and 3 theory test. This is your chance to gain a great understanding of paragliding knowledge and pick our brain mercilessly and is an essential part of your paragliding carreer.

The sessions include

Spring Flying: Jeff Ripley at Moirs Hill on 20th August

Now, that winter is nearly over and with the first XC (attempts) under our belts, it is time to crank up the flying season 2011!

We suggest to start in style, with a OPEN DAY, BBQ and free tandems for our students

Saturday, 3rd September 2011
hopefully at Maioro training site

All our existing and former students can sign up a couple of their mates, new people, sign up for any PG course to be in for a free tandem flight with our NZ Champion pilots!

Gin Soek explains some details of the design of the new Gin Sprint Evo, the latest EN B rated intermediate glider. The first Gin Evos are in Auckland now. WOW, what a step forward!

With the strong NZ$ this is the perfect time to get a sharp deal on an up-grade for the coming flying season. This is a stunning new glider, as each Gin glider it quietly achieves much more than anticipated. More info on the GIN website for the Sprint Evo.

We have just published a Wings & Waves Facebook page! 2011, here we come. I am new to this concept, but apparently it is essential that you visit the page and click "like" on the main page. Only once a certain number of people have done that, the page will get its official username.

Join us at the loft this Saturday for some drinks, hot food, music and a chat. After some spells of bad weather and missing out on the annual club event at the Paeroas, it must be high time to get together.

Saturday, 11th June, from 6 pm at our loft in Bayswater

BYO drinks, we are cooking hot food. Hope to see you there!

Zulu3 KiteMag test

Here is a great test report on the Zulu 3.

It comes to the same conclusion as we have: Great quality to last long, very very stable, light easy handling, extremely versatile kite - great up-wind, great freestyle, stable in waves. And an innovative Safety system. You won't get this combination in any other kite!

GIN Safari Tandem

Gin has brought out a set of extra ordinary tandem equipment. Each piece is very carefully thought through and delivers just what most tandem pilots want. Light, comfortable, safe gear, all certified at that at a fantastic price.

The Yeti reserve range finally delivers a reserve big enough to cover the weight range of your tandem gliders, offering top performance at light weight, is legal (!) light and even affordable!

Lots of gliders - Barry Baxter

I hate admitting it, but it seems we are at the end of the summer which is when we usually run our photo competition.

Last year we had fantastic entries, each showing different aspects of what people like about their sport. I loved the diversity of the different pictures. Have a look at the 2010 PG and kiting winners.

With lots of people owning GoPros and other in-flight cameras now and getting rather proficient with video editing software, we are extending this competition to video clips.

Evan flying low: photo by Marty Taylor mardtaylor@gmail.com

The first Wings & Waves PPG fly-in was a great success: 15 pilots made the trip from all over the North Island to Taumarunui last weekend. This is the record number of PPG pilots to ever meet in NZ. We stayed at the local holiday park with camp owners Phil and Helene (also keen PG pilots) proving to be perfect hosts, right down to wheeling in an outdoor fireplace already fired up for our beer, barbeque and bullshit session on Saturday night.

A chat with local aero club pilots Kevin and Jeanette on Friday afternoon secured us the use of the airport and facilities: Plenty of space for 15 pilots (and more), great facilities, great support.

A last minute update:

The weather is looking great for the weekend. Stew and Shane are heading down on Thursday night ready to check out the airology with an early flight on Friday. I will be going down on Friday morning. Shane's dad is coming down to drive retrieve for us but if you know of anyone else who can drive around picking up the pieces and taking photos then invite them along. It should be quite entertaining just in the take-off paddock.

Reuben hates counting stock and we have a lot of that, both new and second hand, so here we go:

10% off everything on stock

50% off last season's kites

15% off new kites

25% off all GIN accessories

??% on new paragliders - make an offer!

By popular demand, we are running another PG2 theory course, starting

Tuesday, 15 March 2011, 7pm at our loft in Bayswater.

Paramotoring at National Park

Inspired by photos from Stew and Shane of their flights in the area Evan Lamberton, PPG instructor extra-ordinair at Wings & Waves, has hatched a plan to have a weekend (long weekend anyone?) flying and socialising in Taumaranui The local camp ground owner is a keen pilot and there are some big paddocks and an airfield available to fly from. The trip to National Park and the mountains is an easy distance. It is an area generally low on wind and big on landing areas.

Laszlo and his mates had great fun during a speed flying event on the South Island in the end of last year. They flew of Treble Cone and many other sites in the area. Here is some great footage.

Laszlo is a sky diver who lives and flies in Methven, near Christchurch on the South Island. Together with Tux, who runs the Methven Sky diving center, he has been developing conversion courses for sky divers to get into foot-launched speed flying.

Once or twice a year, he organises speed flying meetings. The next one is at Temple Basin in September 2011. Contact us if you interested in joining.

The super PG2 course

Theory done!

A group of PG 2 students recently sat the PG 2 theory test, after 8 good fun and rather social theory evenings. Most results were really good and showed a good understanding of all the important concepts of paragliding.

NZ Champions: Grant Middendorf, Evan Lamberton, Eva Walton-Keim, Reuben Muir, Jeff Ripley

After the first round of the NZ Nationals in Canungra in November, and Round 2 of the NZ Nationals in Wanaka early January, we have new 2011 NZ Champions:

Grant Middendorf, on his brand-new GIN 2liner proto, won the men's competition.

Eva Walton-Keim, on her GIN BoomerangGTO, won the women's competition and came 4th in the men's (3rd Kiwi) which is an all time woman's record. She also had the best Kiwi result for serial gliders, only Ian, a Australian pilot on the same glider, also a GIN GTO was just in front of her.

The Wings & Waves Team, with Reuben Muir, Jeff Ripley, Evan Lamberton and Eva Walton-Keim won the NZ Provincial Paragliding Trophy.