Himalayan Pre-World Cup

The comp started with 103km task on the most stable day of the trip! Admittedly conditions did look great, blue skiies, amazing visibility and a lack of threatening clouds but when the wind dummies failed to climb out followed by half the competitors also struggling to get much above launch it all became just too obvious. No-one made goal though the lead pack were less that 10km short. The wind at big face was strong - oh so strong and after 2 attempts to cross over the west spur I got flushed a third time while still trying vainly to scrape over and put myself in a fairly interesting situation as regards landings, ie. NO landing options or the boulder strewn river bed. Some of the 'pebbles' that i wasn't too concerned about from 2000m suddenly took on proportions the size of a small house as I made the final approach. An ungraceful slalom between boulders saw me decked with a long walk up and out of the river bottom just 35km into the task. I spent the walk and most of the evening deciding what I had done wrong, whether my decision making was just kaput or whether I had made the best decision in the circumstances. Its a tricky one in these types of places - everything within me told me to keep grovelling / soaring and commit everything to climbing out however long it took, but the fact of the terrain is that 'if' you don't get up then the options can range from scary to suicidal. As soon as I turned attention away from getting out even for a nano-second the game was over. The safest landing became the only issue. Sitting unhappily waiting for retrieve I struck up a handsignals conversation with a local Indian lady who was amazed that women can fly..just seeing her increduality at what we do put it all back in perspective and gave me enough grace to consider what a priviledge it is to be able to fly in this amazing scenery.
Day 2 and the task setting committee were a little more realistic on setting the 57km task given the still stable conditions. After an amazing climb out from launch with a Himalayan Griffon Vulture playing trampoline on my wing I spent the entire flight with Ed, climbing gliding and searching for climbs together until we eventually landed together just 8km short of the final tp as the day finished before we did!
Task 3 was a 73km race and I finally managed to make goal - hellishly slow after getting monumentally stuck at Big face but a very necky final glide with my instruments saying I would make it with 30m saw me crossing the line with just...30m (!) and enough height to turn into wind and land in an exhausted heap. In true Indian fashion they had decided to run hot air balloon flights from the goal field and were inflating said balloon right in front of the goal line so that it was completely hidden. As the task was validated by crossing the line and not a cylinder the last km's were slightly stressful since all we could see was an impending ' bouncy castle' and with no tolerance it looked like we would be flying straight into the side of the thing!
Unfortunately after dinner at the local dhaba I came down with 'Bir belly' and missed the final task.
The closing ceremony once again was a media frenzy with the entire proceedings taking place in Hindi and the press pack completely obscuring the presentation. Paragliding is a rather political matter here in Himachal Pradesh and when it comes down to it the pilots are definitely a secondary consideration to the column inches that can be gathered by the local 'minister of this & that'!