Skiing in the Dolomites (again)

After last year's Snowheads bash in the Dolomites, there was no way I was going to miss the opportunity to return. The scenery is stunning, and the snow fantastic. Last year we stayed in Campitello di Fassa, but this year we stayed 1 pass further east in Arabba.

Drove down in the snow Friday night, collecting Talltone from Munich Airport, and then onwards to Innsbruck where we stayed over until Saturday morning. The other guys were arriving at Innsbruck from Gatwick and Manchester, although the Manchester flight was diverted to Munich after an aborted landing due to weather. They all eventually arrived a few hours after us.

Sunday was an easy day, to get the legs working, and to check out a new pair of Salomon GS Race skis. So a few of us headed over towards Corvara and San Cassiano to play around on some mostly blue runs.

Monday was a day to push the skis a bit more, so another group of us did the 40km anti-clockwise Sella Ronda circuit.

Tuesday was the first day to ski over to Malga Ciapella and take the 3 end-to-end cable cars up to Marmolada, just over 1 mile higher. The view up there is amazing, and seriously recommended.

On Wednesday a group started the Sella Ronda clockwise circuit early, but I decided to have a late start. Eventually, 2 of us decided that as we were both on GS race skis, we could chase them down and catch them up by late morning coffee break. It turned out that we actually beat them to the coffee bar by 5 minutes, even though we were doing the same route! Then all of us took a diversion from the circuit to visit Santa Christina, which involves a snazzy funicular, a gondola and then a chairlift. The area is brilliant, and the 1st pizzeria from the top of the mountain was the best pizza I've had outside of Rome/Frascati. After that, we finished the circuit at rifugio Plan Boè, where the entire group met for dinner, followed by a torch-lit night ski back down in to town.

Thursday was another easy morning, but then 3 of us decided to squeeze in another trip up to the top of Marmolada. This was the fastest descent I've made from there, which is extremely tiring due to the lower oxygen levels at altitude.

Friday was the last day, so a few of us just headed back over to Corvara to play around in the powder snow that had fallen overnight. Visibility was a bit poor, but the snow was superb.

Can't wait to go back to the Dolomites again next year!

Pictures are here...
http://picasaweb.google.com/andysrockets/SHBB2010Arabba

Skiing in Sölden

First skiing trip of the season was an intermediate/advanced coaching clinic courtesy of Scott and Rob from Inside Out Skiing. Sölden (Austria) was chosen because of it's reasonably high altitude and 2 glaciers to ski on in the very early part of the ski season.

The plan was for this to be a Piste Performance clinic, but since it dumped it with snow after 1 day, it morphed into an off-piste clinic too. So we managed to do a little bit of everything from GS carving to Powder to Crud within the week.

It was a fantastic week, fantastic snow, and a great bunch of people to ski with. Can't wait for the next ski trip (Snowheads bash in the Dolomites again, hopefully), and maybe a return to Sölden for another coaching clinic next year!

Pics can be seen here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/andysrockets/SHTrainingBashSolden

Karmic Koala

Just some initial thoughts about Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala, whilst I am installing and checking it out.

Netbook Remix version
Running on an Asus eeePC 901, currently running as a Live SD card.

Like:
- It looks pretty
- Black theme is better than brown
- NBR desktop looks much better than Jaunty version
- WiFi connected rapidly
- Sound level is correct out of the box (not need to frig PulseAudio)
- Audio buttons work
- Screen brightness works
- Files, new packages etc. are persistent on the Live SD

Don't Like:
- Software Centre (n00bs might like it, but I don't)
- Empathy does do IRC, but is really really bad (I had to RTFM!)
- Daft border to the notification bubble (flickers if you hit volume up many times for example)

Broken:
- Managed to corrupt/crash the NBR desktop
- When desktop corrupted need to power off
- Had to force WiFi reconnection after reboot


64-bit version
Running on an AMD X2 3800+ with Nvidia 6600 (fanless) graphics

Like:
- Better set of defaults in Software Sources (no need to add restricted extras)
- Fast boot (40s + BIOS activity), even faster shutdown (5s to be off)
- Firefox is faster than in Jaunty (and seems more stable)

Don't Like:
- Slightly jumpy sound when logging in (may be disc busy?)
- Empathy is bad. Real Bad.
- Ubuntu one is flaky, so added Dropbox (don't care about tomboy/evolution).

Broken:
- Doesn't install to MacBook properly - fatal grub2 issues.

Will be updating this post as I check out each feature, and try all the packages.

ALRS 2009

First weekend in October was my 6th (I think) trip to the ALRS rocket event in Switzerland. This was the 10th ALRS event in Val de Ruz, in the Jura just up the hill from Neuchatel.

Saturday was very sunny, and virtually no wind, so I flew the Tiny Pterodactyl (its 2nd flight) on an Aerotech F52-8T. It was debatable whether a 5s or 8s delay was best but it turned out that 8s was spot one. Flight was perfect, and it drifted right back to where we were standing. Then decided to fly the Art Applewhite Saucer (7inch) on an E30, which was certainly a crowd pleaser :) Landed about 50m away.

Sunday was a bit breezy, but I had to use up an Aerotech I218-R (Redline) motor. So that went in my Rebel Pirate. They are nice punchy little motors and the red flame looks cool too. Rocket landed about 500m away, which was not too bad.

Over the weekend, there were at least 5 Level 3 cert attempts, and I believe 4 successes.

Highlight was the 85kg Ariane 4 launching again on M1939 in the main stage, then 2x K550 and 2x J350 in the 4 boosters. The 4 boosters separate at burnout and the whole thing comes down in 6 parts on 6 chutes. Very impressive to see.

All pics can be seen here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/andysrockets/ALRS2009

IRW 2009

August saw my 17th annual trip to Largs, Scotland for the essential International Rocketry Week. Weather was a bit iffy all week, but there were still enough breaks in the weather to fly up on Fairlie Moor.
First flight of the week was my Qubit on a D11-P, for a live broadcast on Radio Scotland. Then on various days, the Art Applewhite Saucer (7inch version) saw much action mainly with Phil's and Mike's Microhybrids, plus one of Mike's spare Aerotech E15's, while the Qubit used up some more of my Estes D11's.

Didn't fly any HPR, mainly due to the wind, but it was fun to watch the Dutch guys fly a rather small rocket on a K550 to 15,000ft+ and then have to recover it from 2 valleys away! Oh and another rocket ending up in the reservoir, only to be retrieved a few days later by boat.

Complete picture album can be found here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/andysrockets/IRW2009