This section chronicles the daily skydiving activities at our school in Ocaña Spain for November 2005.  

1st November 2005

Welcome to Stuart James Abel who has joined us to learn to skydive. He did his ground school yesterday and started jumping this morning with Andy Gregory. By teatime he had completed five skydives.

Also joining us for his second holiday in less than three months is Danny Jenkins. Danny is a soldier on tour in Afghanistan and used his break to squeeze in a spot of jumping. Danny will do a few solos and then get stuck into our formation skydiving course. Danny is an aff student who trained with us here in Ocaña.

Tim Found is cracking on with the solos and also completed his hop and pop.

Grant Raedel also joined us yesterday for a Base jumping course with Ulli and Paula. He has been practicing his canopy skills in advance of his first BASE in the next few days. He is pictured here doing a BASE pack.. as much care goes into this Pack as that of a reserve . Ulli who has thousands of

Congratulations also to Stephen Freestone who finished his AFF course today and qualified to jump solo.

He trained exclusively with Doctor Ulli and is pictured here being presented with his VHS video of all his skydives.

Welcome to Zahid Yousaf who joins us from London. Zahid is an It manager from London and will train one on one with Andy Guler. Zahid arrived yesterday , did his ground school this morning and his level one this evening.

Welcome also to Lee Wood who joins us to learn to skydive. Lee ground schooled today and will jump tommorrow.

So all in all a good day at the Freefall University . We flew fifteen porter loads which aint bad for a tuesday.

A massive congratulations to one of our Instructors – Tim Boyd who got married near his home today to Paula ( Boyd I guess now ! ). All the staff and im sure your students wish you all the joys of marraige . Tim and Paula will spend the next month on honeymoon in Brazil.

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2nd November 2005

Well done to Stuart James Abel from Scotland who graduated his AFF course. He started jumping yesterday and finished today and even had time for a solo this afternoon! He trained with Andrew Gregory.

Stuart decided to think about what he wanted on his graduation quote whilst mulling over a few pints in cheers… so check back in tommorrow to see what he has to say..

Zahid and Lee did three jumps each today, they had the opportunity for more but wanted to take it easy. Zahid is on level five next and Lee on level four. Danny Jenkins did another five solos.

Stephen is pictured here with Andy. Stephen is looking rather happy with himself as he has just jumped his own pack job. Two days ago Stephen didnt know anything about packing but has been working with Andy. Stephen decided to open early ( 6000ft on the jump ) to ” be sure ” … he need not have worried .. he said it was one of his best openings yet.

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2nd November.

A bit windy for student jumping today. However we did run continuation courses. Kevin Dawes joined arrived last night for to undertake our BPA FS1 certification program. He is pictured here with Louis our primary freefly coach ( Avalore ) .

Kevin did five training jumps with Louis and then did the certification dive which he nailed ! Congratulations Kevin.

Kevin will now start training with Paula Silva and start his birdman training. Profits from our AFF courses continue to be ploughed into our continuation courses and we have ordered another three birdman suits. Two staff have also bought suits. We now have people registered for our birdman camp on the 27th of December, there are some slots available still, contact us for details. You must have a minimum of 200 jumps to take part.

Andy found a picture from our recent wind tunnell training camp in Switzerland. We will run another tunnell camp, this time in England in the Bedford wind tunnell in Jan of 2006.

Grant Raedel and Ulli have gone of base jumping and Grant has done his first base! He and Ulli have made a total of four bridge jumps today.

3rd November

Congratulations to Lee Wood who finished his AFF course today. Lee is here for another week and will occupy himself solo jumping , learning to pack and course course ( and he is a Scotsman ) sampling the night life in Aranjuez.

Freefly action today for Kevin aswell as the groundschool for his first Birdman flight tommorrow. Also training was Freefly Avalore. Rob McVeigh took this picture of David Downham and Louis in action over the Freefall University Ocaña.

This branch of freeflying is known as head down and you can learn to fly like this on one of our freefly courses.

Also joining us again is Ian Newlands who learned to skydive with us in September of this year. Ian popped down from the UK to escape the english weather and to get his first jumps in on his new rig which he bought through our shop here in Ocaña.

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4th November

Your ba**s get bigger when you graduate! Check out Stuart James Abel pictured in the middle as he strides towards the aircraft for another solo jump , flanked by Tim Found and Lee Wood.

Congratulations to Kevin Dawes who did his first birdman flight today. Kevin managed a flight of 1 minutes 30 seconds on his suit which is amazing for a first flight! Especially as Beginner birdmen open at 5000ft.

Welcome back to Brett Shepherd from the UK who did his AFF course with us in Ocaña. Brett has returned to do some more solo jumping for a long weekend.

Brett took along his brother for a long weekend in Aranjuez. Darryl used the opportunity to try skydiving on one of our tandem skydives and loved the expereine so much that he now describes himself as ” hooked ” . He will be back next year to do our AFF course.

5th November

Welcome to Alan Jones from London who joins us to learn to skydive. He did his ground school this afternoon and will be on the first load tommorrow. He is training exclusivley with the Doctor..

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6th November

Alan Jones did well today and completed the first four levels of his AFF course. He will be on level five tommorrow morning.

Congratulations to Justin Thwaite who todaty achieved his FF1 Freefly rating. This certifies him to jump with other freeflyers in the seated position or sit fly.
He is pictured here with Louis Harwood his coach.

He is seen here towards the end of his dive recieving a signal from Louis.

Meanwhile Kevin Dawes is up to fifteen birdman flights and is now back coaching with Paula our Birman Instructor. They did some dives to practice the skills required to flock dive ( flying together in large groups ).

Welcome back to MAthew Gardner who trained with us last month. Mathew has found an apartment in Aranjuez and is now a resident jumper at the dropzone and will be here for the next few months at least.

11th November 2005

Sorry theres not been more updates recently but myself and the PC became seperated for a few days. We have tons going on. Lets start here:

Welcome to Richard Cann who is here to complete his BPA FS1 formation skydiving course. Richard is from London. He is jumping with Oscar.

Also welcome to Stephen Bury who is here also to to his fs1 formation skydiving certificate. He is jumping with Josh Burill ( BPA AFF and FS1 instructor ) who competes in UK skydiving based team Southparc (13.5 Average seniors ).

Welcome to Katy Hearn from London who is here to learn to skydive. She is jumping with doctor Ulli and did two skydives this afternoon and is on level three next. She did so well she was released on her first jump by her secondary instructor.

Welcome also to Rachel Wenham who is here to do our beginners accelerated freefall course. She is training with Andy Guler. She did three skydives today again cracking and is on level four.

Welcome also to Kevin Pinkstone who is here to learn to skydive. Kevin is training with Andy Gregory and did three skydives today also. Kevin said when i spoke with him ” cant think ,, cant talk ..too much adrenaline ” ..

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some returning students, welcome to Sylvan Butt who is here again having been with us only last month.

Dan Atkins from Ireland joins us for another weekend of jumping .Danny trained with is in early 2004.

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14th November .

Check out our wind tunnel trips. Join the growing gang ( 9.5 hours now for December so not much time left ) . Or why not join our Jan Dates ? Details available here. These camps are managed by our formation skydiving director , Andy Guler

18th November

Sorry , updates are a little thin on the ground! We have been working on other projects. Here is Rachel Wenhams Graduation photo..well done!

Carl Williams says to say “hello” to all the lurkers out there..

Kevin Pinkstone is doing great, he has one more jump to make to qualify to jump solo.

Welcome Also to Katie Wilson who started her AFF in earnest today. Katie is doing really well and should finish tommorrow.

Whats with all the ” Wilsons” this week ? Here is Adam who has also joined us to learn to skydive and is doing well.

The last of the Wilsons ! Here is Brian Wilson from Scotland who is also here on an AFF course.

ok, update. Kevin Pinkstone graduated !

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We were also joined by Okan Akin from London who joins us to complete an introduction to skydiving . He completed some jumps today.

Welcome back to Ben Lewis, Aimee Gregory ( who recently got married to one of our AFF instructors Andy Gregory ) and Paul Anker who are back for some fun jumping. Paul trained with the Freefall University and purchased his equipment thourgh the Freefall University. Aerodyne is becoming a major partner to the Freefall University. We recently orderd another 3 sets of kit with them for the school .

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19th November 2005

So well done to todays graduates! First up is Katie Wilson. Katie also complete some solo jumps and her BPA level 8.

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Adam Wilson , also graduated , jumped solo and completed his AFF level 8.

Welcome to Irene from Australia , but living in London for a few months who joins us for a basic formation skydiving course.

Welcome to John Land from London who joined us for his skydiving lessons today. John will spend the next week with us.

Welcome to AJ from the US who is here to learn to skydive with us. AJ is training with Andy Gregory.

Ruth Bridge a former student of Ulli Bulli popped in to see us, it was a flying visit she came down from the UK with her brother to watch him do a tandem skydive as a surprise for his 40th birthday.

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20th November 2005

Congratulations to John Land from Scotland who completed his aff course today.

21st November 2005
Congratulations to Brian Wilson from Scotland who finished his AFF course today.

Pete Clarke also popped in for the weekend to get some freefly training with Louis. We just discovered Louis and his Team Avalore.

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22nd November 2005

Kevin Pinkstone is racking up the jumps now and has extended his stay with us by another week. This is the second such extenstion to Kevins holiday… perhaps hes not gonna go home…

Another AFF student learning to skydive with us at the moment is Shaun Trigg from the UK. Shuan works in Iraq and joined us for his holiday leave.

23rd November

Congratulations to AJ who completes his AFF courses and is now skydiving solo to beat the band.

The Swiss four way team are also in training hard this week , so the porter is up and down like a yo yo. Dont be surprised if we break the school record for the number of solos done be a recent student done in a day which currently stands at nine solo jumps. These guys are top notch and time spent with any of them on our Formation skydiving courses is time well spent. They give you a firm foundation in more than the basics.

They are also jumping eight way.

We just found a picure of our DZ taken by a satelite. You can see the facilities, but also the landing area which extends well beyond the runway to the left. This is great expecially for people who are learning to jump. Obstacle free and HUGE are the watchwords. The size of the landing area will make a difference to how comfortable you feel when learning , you can learn to land accuratley , because its a good skill to have as opposed to worrying about having to land accuratley or else… click to see our DZ from Space . You can zoom in and out to take a closer look.

24th November

check out the Sunset photo from this evenings 8 way… Toby Zumsteg clicked this one just as the team fell level with the sunset on the horizon.

Congratulations to Katy Hearn who completed her AFF training in Netheravon last weekend. Katy spent a few days training with us and then continued from where she left off in the UK and finished levels 5,6,7 and eight with flying colours!

Congratulations also to Shaun Trigg who graduted his AFF courses with us. We are awaiting his graduation picture.

Greetings from the ” THRILL SEEKERS ” . And John , do apologise you are of course from London! This picture was taken in Cheers Bar , where the bar maids are pretty , speak English and serve cracking beer. People generally hang out here before heading of to the Avalon or Hangar Bar for late night antics..

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29th November 2005

The Swiss mixed it up today with some local jumpers. Toby whos been a busy cameraman this week took this picture.

So well done to Paula Silva who today qualified as a USPA coach and AFF Instructor. Paula is slowly adding to her qualifications . Birdman , base and now AFF!.

November the 29th.

Welcome to Gareth Couldrey who joined us today to complete his aff course.

Welcome to Mark Rees who joined us today also to complete an AFF course.

Welcome also to Clive Courtney pictured here with Ulli our rigger learning to pack parachutes . Clive is learning to pack his new set of gear supplied by the Freefall University. We can supply a number of brands through our onsite shop.

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Gareth did three AFF levels today with Bristol Andy. Sweet as a nut on level three Gareth is on level four tommorrow.

Welcome to Andy Star , Andy is Active Skydiving trained. He joins us for a weeks fun jumping. He has tried his hand at birdman already.

Welcome back to Sam Davies , who joined us again for some furhter freefly lessons .

Mark Rees is thundering on also and did his level three today with doctor Ulli 🙂 He will do level four tommorrow.

Amelia is also back for another weeks jumping.

quick link:

Tandem skydiving in Spain