Bassano del Grappa, Italy

MY MOMENT

Bassano, the warmth that stayed with me.

Whenever I think of Bassano del Grappa, I remember the article I wrote, ‘Bassano—The Warmth That Stays in My Heart’. To me, it has always been a special place for thermal flying. As the weather cools and thermals elsewhere in the Alps begin to fade, people still look towards Bassano. And early in the new year, it soon has us looking forward to flying again.

I had only recently gained my paragliding licence when I went there specifically to learn thermal flying for the first time. Until then, I hadn’t really experienced climbing steadily in rising air or staying aloft for a long time. I didn’t fly cross-country on that trip, but I circled upwards to my heart’s content, flew high, and stayed up for ages. It was there that I first truly felt the appeal of paragliding.

Even now, those flights bring back a feeling of warmth. What lifted me in Bassano was more than the air rising through the mountains. It was the excitement of discovering a whole new world. That warmth flowed from the sky into my heart, and it has never quite left.