My AirOne does battle with the Sciliar Massif.

Flying the Seiser Alm

A not so iconic flight on an iconic slope.

There are many sites available to the slope flying enthusiast, but there is a shortlist of places that have a magic ring to it. Slopes you know from great videos on YouTube and slopes that you read about in the magazines. Torrey Pines, Monte Lema, Hahnenmoos — that category. During my model flying career I have visited a good number of slopes, but one that kept haunting me has always been the Seiser Alm. A motorhome trip to Austria seemed like a good opportunity for a visit.

Driving in the Dolomiti mountains is a joy on its own.

The Seiser Alm (or Alpe di Siusi, in Italian) is a huge alpine meadow area located in the northern Italian Dolomiti mountains. The area is called South Tyrol and is very much connected to the Austrian province of Tyrol. You hear more people speaking German than Italian. Driving through the Dolomiti mountains can be challenging as the roads are ever winding. Navigating our medium-sized motorhome over these roads takes some effort on the steering muscles, but the reward is a constantly changing landscape with spectacular views of bare, pointy, vertically rising mountain peaks.

The flying spot on the Seiser Alm is located at the top of the Spitzbühl chairlift at an altitude of 1940m. You can drive all the way to the base of the chairlift, but only very early as the road closes for the day at 9am. Today the Spitzbuhl lift is closed due to works. The chairlift is no option anyway because of our Labrador Waldo who joins us. We take the cabin lift from the valley, from the top station we hike the good part of an hour to reach the Spitzbühl. The hike is a little steep for the first 15 minutes, then the trail gets a more comfortable gradient and we truly enjoy the hike. The views are amazing, with differently shaped mountains and landscapes in every direction.

Magnificent views in every direction. Two gliders are packed in a trekking backpack that sits comfortably on my back during the hike.

Reaching the Spitzbühl flying spot we first enjoy a nice lunch in the restaurant overlooking the start area. My lunch is a traditional wood board with different meats, cheeses and bread. Somehow this tastes so much better having sore legs, breathing thin mountain air and enjoying a fitting view.

A traditional Alpine lunch: a meat and cheese platter with bread.

When I assemble my two gliders several paragliders appear, taking over the area. They do a lot of tandem flights from this location. I patiently wait until they depart before I throw my AirOne model over the edge. What follows is a bit of a disappointment. I know that on this location you don’t really soar the slope wind, but you use mainly thermals (see Resources below for my previous article on this subject). Despite the excellent sunny weather, the thermals are hard to find and even harder to use effectively. Every now and then the model gets two seconds of rising air and I cheer “I found it!”, but next thing you know the lift has reversed to sink. The model loses quite some altitude but I don’t want to use the motor unless absolutely necessary. Somehow I struggle my way back to eye level, but I do not manage to get a lot higher.

Struggling to make the most of the messy lift.

But it’s not all bad news. Finally I’m standing at this iconic location with its unmistakable panoramic view. To my left the Sciliar Massif, bare rocks sticking vertically from the Earth forming a range of peaky mountain tops — just like in the YouTube videos I have always admired. It’s a truly jaw-dropping scene and a perfect background for dramatic soaring videos. Despite the mediocre flying conditions I enjoy every second of this flight.

The Sciliar Massif make for a dramatic background for my flight. See also the key photo above the title.

The normal landing field is closed for works in the area, so I have to land the glider on the starting spot at my feet. No problem with a four-flapped F3B wing, but a big scale glider would pose a challenge here and now. Normally a nice landing field is available next to the restaurant and the big ones can be flown there.

Unfortunately the conditions on this day have not been as perfect as in many of the movies I watched. Yet I am totally satisfied with the whole experience. The very enjoyable hike to the flying spot, the superb views while flying and the knowledge that I have flown on the Seiser Alm make for an unforgettable day. And I do have a good excuse to keep this location on the to-do list. One day I will fly the Seiser Alm as it’s meant to be.

I’ll be back.

©2022 Raymond Esveldt

Resources

• Dolomites Region Seiser Alm — From the website: “Majestic Dolomite peaks. Charming places. Sociable people. The largest high alpine pasture in Europe. 300 days of sun. The beauty of the Dolomites Region Seiser Alm is legendary…”

Also by the Author

• My Slope Flying Sojourn in the UK — From the August, 2022 issue: “As a slope flying enthusiast I regularly scour YouTube for inspiration. Movies of the most beautiful slope locations in the UK…”
• Flying in the Mountains — From the July, 2022 issue: “Gliders have two ways of staying aloft. In my country the Netherlands we use almost exclusively thermals…”
• How to Create Great RC Soaring Videos — From the May, 2022 issue:“On YouTube there are countless videos that show our hobby. But the majority of those videos…”
• How to Create Spectacular Multishot Photos — From the April, 2022 issue: “The process naturally starts at making the photos. It is very important that the lighting of all the photos is…”

All images by the author. Read the next article in this issue, return to the previous article in this issue or go to the table of contents. A PDF version of this article, or the entire issue, is available upon request.