By: Brian Buckland

If a friend asked you if you wanted to travel to rural South Carolina for a long weekend in the near 100 degree heat, put on a black jumpsuit and run around in the sun, you might think they weren’t the best friends in the world.  But when that friend tells you that’s CarolinaFest 2011, you grab that jumpsuit and run out the door!  Which is exactly what I did.  I just got back a few days ago and it was a fun time for sure, oh yeah, and there were some great jumps in there too!  Let me tell you a little bit about it.  If you’d like to SEE MY FULL POST CLICK HERE.

The best story times are the ones with pictures.  For starters, I found out early on that Simon had his tube tied.  I didn’t know he could do that, but it’s better safe than sorry!  That guys naked half the time as it is so why not play safe!  And then there was Mel.  She must have been pissed off at something cause she was throwing out the “C” if you know what I mean.  Maybe I missed a shot or something, I guess I’ll just have to try harder next time.  Or maybe she was just trying to give Simon a “C” for the top of his tube?  Not sure…

Then there was the time that my helmet flew off on opening.  Yikes….talk about all sorts of badness.  Can you imagine what my face would look like if I lost all of that expensive camera gear?  Well, lucky for my quick reactions, because when my helmet DID fly off my head, I managed to grab it at just about full arms reach away from me.  So as soon as I realized I had it securely in my hands, I did what any good photographer would do, I spun it around to catch the astonishment on my face!  When I told Angela about it later, she had the same reaction!

I told Amy about a SkyHook I just saw in action and she was like, ‘What’s the big deal?’ and getting up an in my face and stuff.  Back off Chmelecki!  It’s just a SkyHook!  But man, to see it up close and personal, it was like an instant reserve canopy!  Giddyup!

Well, that’s about it for my wrap up on CarolinaFest 2011.  If you’d like to SEE THE ENTIRE GALLERY CLICK HERE.  I hope you enjoyed my story.  To leave you I will ask you a question.  What do you get when you throw a party, tell everyone to wear a pink costume, provide 3 Margarita machines full of booze, and tell the winners that they get either a free golden Cypres or 20 jumps with 20 pack jobs?  Not sure?  Well, let me show you what you get.   The 20th Anniversary Cypres Pink Party.   Hope you enjoy!

In issue #20, Doc shared some tips he wished he’d known before going to his first boogie. (By the way, you do know that’s beer, right Doc?) What are your first boogie tips and stories?

photo by kilgarron

We have it. Bad. With the sun staying up a little bit longer every day, the temperatures climbing and the unnatural curse of daylight savings time about to come to an end, we can feel the gypsy blood in our veins starting to boil. It’s time to broaden horizons by visiting new dropzones, meet up with old friends and maybe make some new ones. It’s time for fun jumps, geting a little silly, drink cheap beer and swap stories around the bonfire.

With how much skydivers like to travel, it’s no accident that we devote a couple of pages in the magazine every month exclusively to featuring events and places to jump. But we need help from the Blue Skies Mag community here, to pick the right ones to attend. Which ones can we not miss out on? Which ones suck? Are there any new ones that we should know about?
How about records, fundraisers, community support or any of that fun stuff?
Well, we want it all. Those of you involved in planning for your respective DZ’s, make sure to sign us up for your newsletter and list your events (for free) in the Events section of our website. If you don’t have a newsletter, fine – just drop us a line – but make sure you give us at least 8 weeks notice if at all possible.

For those of you just burning to write an article about your boogie experience –

keep in mind that we accept those, as long as you can find a unique, fun and interesting way of presenting it. If you have an cool idea, by all means read this and then chat with the editor!

Happy Boogie Season!

The two Blue Skies Mag chicks are here at Skydive Elsinore for Chicks Rock Boogie. Blue Skies Mag dude is at home eagerly awaiting photos

By the awesome K-Dub:

We’d like to welcome our newest subscriber, Crystal Prom, better known as “That Girl Who Landed In the Tree at CarolinaFest 2010,” or “TreeGirl” for short.

Where nicknames are born. Yes, there is a girl dangling under that canopy. Photo by Trunk/Hypoxic.

TreeGirl handled a scary situation like a pro, going up for a second jump later that day. For that kind of spunk, bravery and badassedness, we had to give her a complimentary subscription to Blue Skies Mag. She also got 50% off a Mirage rig from a slightly inebriated Ward Hessig (pictures on the far left) later that night. (Helpful boogie tip: if you want any Mirage shwag, give Ward liquor.)

Congrats, TreeGirl, now you’re really a skydiver!

Well, not *right* now, because we still have to get some honest work done behind the desk, but come Thursday June 3rd, you can expect to find Blue Skies Magazine setting up a temporary office in a tent on Vendor Row at Skydive Carolina.
We are looking forward to spending the weekend in the beautiful countryside of Chester, SC attending Carolinafest.  Which means you can find us right there to either get yourself a subscription, get information in person as to how to submit photos or articles or any other information you might want to get about Blue Skies Magazine – as we come up on our first anniversary in July.

We hope to see a lot of old friends and meet some new ones – so those of you that are coming, please do stop by the tent and say hi!  Rumor has it that SkyGod himself might attend, so make sure to secure your women!

Lincoln Sport Parachute Club (LSPC) turned 50-years-old this year! To celebrate, the volunteer organization threw Nebraska’s best boogie, the annual Redemption Boogie, July 16-19. Over 200 people were registered to jump from Skydive Arizona’s Otter, fill up on specialty beers and chow down on the best smoked pork, courtesy of club member Duane Hansen, named #1 at Syracuse Ribfest 2009.

LSPC annually donates a portion of the boogie proceeds to the American Cancer Society. This year would be no different until a week prior to the boogie, a friend of the club had a hard landing, putting himself in the hospital all busted up. Immediately, plans were in motion to include benefits from the boogie for the club’s fallen friend. The cashier had a bucket for jump tickets and cash as well as sold plates for $2. Saturday at sunset the plates were placed in the landing area for the Big Money Elmo Drop (Elmo just happens to be LSPC’s mascot). The full-size mannequin has his own gear and was static-lined from one of the club’s Cessna-182s. He landed on the opposite side of the runway so some measuring had to be done to determine the winner. The lucky plate belonged to Lee Baney; he did not keep the winnings, rather donated it all to the cause.

Cool stuff happened in the air—state records, Skyhook demos and the introduction of the Bradicole. What happens when you let the reps from Sky Venture Colorado talk you into a hybrid where two of the hangers are on their head? You get The Bradicole (Brad Cole + radical). SkyVenture Colorado sent three reps to skydive in every discipline. If there was a dive someone had always wanted to do, they got it done. SkyVenture also donated an hour of coached tunnel time to be awarded to the highest bidder, with all proceeds given to LSPC. SkyVenture also with raffled off 30-min and 15-min blocks for folks on the early risers load. Aerodyne, Liquid Sky, FireFly, PD, UPT-Vector and Vertical Suits were on site; check out redemptionboogie.com for a complete list of vendors that contributed.

After alleviating some stress, the ladies set a Nebraska Women 8-way State record. When a couple 10-ways don’t work out, focus on getting everyone in their freefly suits for a sit-round. It helps when seven of the eight women are wearing Fire Fly Suits and the owner of Fire Fly, Sherry Jasnos, is also on the dive. All they did was look hot and voila, record! Happily sharing the spotlight, the women stepped aside to applaud organizer Jerry Eddens for getting people riled up to set a POPS State Record. With the help of Mark Farrell, POPS completed a 12-way on their first try!!!!

This boogie continues to grow while keeping its home-town feel. Turbine aircraft, camping, showers, food, beer, a strongly supported boogiemeister, committee and a whole lot of volunteer hours keep people coming back and LSPC couldn’t be happier!

by Russ Haas
photos by Eric Bernetzke

…with the sound of skydiving! I’m talking about Seven Hills Skydivers, located near Marshall, WI, which is just a hop, skip and—dare I say, a jump—from Madison. But as the locals will tell ya’, it’s in the smack-dab-middle of the purtiest country you ever did see right there in the heart of Wisconsin.

The PAC takes off

Not too long back, a friend of mine invited me to visit this club DZ for their annual “Head for the Hills” boogie June 18-21, and if I’d like, I could even help out with tandem instruction and shooting video. Never one to forgo a normal weekend of jumping at home (located near Green Bay), I responded, “I don’t know, it’ll cut into my summer jumping.” And then it dawned on me…this was summer skydiving! “And did I mention,” he cooed, “they’ll have a PAC?” Sold! I didn’t need to hear anything else. Coming from a dz where Cessna 182s rule the roost, I didn’t need much more of an excuse to head for the hills, and that’s just what the wife and I did.

The first thing we noticed when we got to Seven Hills was the distinct shortage of seven hills. For a lack of a better description, the land is pretty flat, and even from the air I had a hard time distinguishing mounds of any sort (unless you count the hot brunette I took for a tandem, but that was my wife, and I’ll save that story for another time). Turns out that the DZ gets its name from the seven hills of Rome, but what exactly those were I haven’t a clue ‘cuz I didn’t dig any deeper into the origin. I never was much of a history buff.

What I am a fan of is skydiving, and there was plenty of that to be had. Chicago Skydiving Center was kind enough to lease their PAC 750XL to the DZ for the long weekend, and when it arrived, it flew at every opportunity. Sure, there were your occasional weather holds, ‘cuz what’s a Wisconsin summer weekend without at least a thunderstorm and a tornado warning or two? But the rain and the warnings passed, and when they did, we jumped. Honestly, you had to, because if you didn’t jump, you’d have to suffer the consequences and be forced to graze on the acres of food that were supplied pretty much from sun up to sun down. And the food was goooood!

Tandem Instructor Phil gets pumped with his student

Let me ask you something—how much did you pay in registration for your last boogie, and what did that registration fee entitle you to? I don’t know about you, but I’d have to search far and wide to beat the goodies my $25 registration fee got me for my three days of attendance. I know I already mentioned the food, which not only tasted great, but was homemade (thanks to the generosity of club members). In addition to the food was the beer—all you could drink! And let me tell you, it went down well after a day of sweating it out in the sun. It wasn’t the only relief, though, because even when jumping was on, you could always pack in the air-conditioned clubhouse, grab a free bottled water, take a cool shower in the DZ washroom, lay in the shade of the wooded camping area or relax and chill out to the tunes played throughout the day and night. All this for little more than the cost of a jump ticket! If there were complaints, they didn’t come from me, ‘cuz I was too busy chasing the Mrs. away from all the free JELL-O shots! Damn, woman, quit hoggin’ ‘em all!

What the registration couldn’t buy, though, was the hospitality, generosity, and friendship the people of Seven Hills provided to those of us who were visiting for the weekend. I’ve been in this sport long enough to know what to expect from drop zones and skydiving events of various shapes and sizes. I didn’t expect to be treated quite so well, however. To be asked to get on a jump, to be thanked for getting involved, to be invited to share in a story or joke…these are the small things that make or break a boogie, and it all boils down to one thing: the people. And like the food, the beer, and the vibes, the people of Seven Hills are good.

CRW pilots complete a 4-stack over 7 Hills

On that note, I’d like to offer my thanks to all the people who made the 2009 Head for the Hills boogie a blast. For fear of getting names wrong or worse yet, forgetting them entirely, I’ll just pay thanks as anonymously as I can. Thanks to the dude who first greeted us and continuously checked in to see how we were doing. We’re still doing great, but I’m a little hurt that you haven’t called to ask me once more. Thank you, manifest gals; your job is tough, I get that, but you always made me feel appreciated all the same. Thank you to the guy who packed nearly fifty tandem rigs on his own. It’s probably not a record, but it kept me and the other TIs in the air without delay. Thank you, Mr. Pilot; you fly airplane good! Thanks to the ground crew, who ensured the plane stayed tied down, the packing tent stayed up, and all the other behind-the-scenes stuff fell into place. Thanks to the guy who ran with his head cut off making sure communications were kept up. To the video guys and editing producer: you made the students look good! I didn’t fare so well, but honestly, if three plastic surgeons can’t help me, neither can you. Thanks to the Tandem Examiner who provided that extra instruction; I hope to make you proud, chief! Food providers, you know how appreciative I am of you (and that includes the chef who grilled in the rain)! For all the players who contributed anything to make this event a success, props to you! Thanks to everyone who made my wife happy – Giggles/Jell-O Shot Girl thanks, you! Number 2, thanks for inviting us. And finally, to the guy who went around zip-tying all the tents shut and somehow missed mine, I thank you the most! You would not have wanted to be in that tent if I couldn’t have made it out for one of those frantic nature calls!

There’s more to say that I could go on about, but who wants to read about 9-way CRW formations, off-field cemetery landings, or pants-less tandem students? Those are topics to be discussed around a roaring campfire with good friends and a cool beverage in hand, something you’ll easily be able to find the next time you visit Seven Hills Skydiving Club. So if you’re ever in central Wisconsin, and you feel the need to drop in on one of the flattest yet most scenic drop zones of the upper Midwest, the folks there will be sure to welcome you. As for me, I’m not sure the next time I’ll be able to pop in for a visit, but if someone asks me if I’m returning to this boogie again next year, I’ll tell you what my answer will be: Hill yeah!

The next Head for the Hills boogie is tentatively scheduled for September 11-13, 2009.