Over the weekend I got to catch up with some TV I’d taped over Easter. The most important thing I’d been wanted to watch being Bear Grylls: Mission Everest which had been shown on Channel 4.

The special featured the efforts of Bear and Gilo to become the first men to paramotor higher than Mount Everest (originally they’d planned to paramotor over it, but Bear judged this route too hazardous, partly due to the danger of flying into Chinese airspace.

Watching the 90 minute special was basically a case of spending 80 minutes thinking they must be nuts. The project was met with disaster after disaster, with Gilo, the paramotoring expert, designing a completely new paramotor to make the attempt. This meant him spending hardly any time at home, and his business suffering as he had to dedicate all his time to its design and construction.

The project then started to run on, with the initial test flight in the French Alps delayed, and a later test flight in a wind tunnel turning to disaster when the engine froze and cracked.

When they eventually did test fly the engine, Bear came close to dying when his wing tangled, although he fortunately managed to untangle it in time to slow his descent (although not slow enough that he didn’t still hit the ground at some speed - I’m no expert but that looked flippin sore).

However they did manage to make it to Everest, and despite Gilo being forced to fly in an untested second paramotor (which he only finished constructing in time for it to be shipped out), the final 10 minutes showed what it was all about. As they soared into the Sky, it was truely breath-taking to watch, so it must truely have been an awesome experience for them both. Sadly their instrumentation froze at 25,000 feet, so they’ll never be able to know for sure how high they got. Gilo was forced to land early after his engine broke down, but Bear flew even higher, and says that he managed to be above all the peaks.

It was an awesome spectacle, and a great special. The new series of Born Survivor starts next week, and I’m really looking forward to it

Well, Friday night was the latest Riechoes gig.

This time they were playing Nice ‘N’ Sleazy in Glasgow, and the place was packed. Despite being the first band up, the downstairs was standing room only (and not much of that), with a great atmosphere as they played through their set. Some great new tracks as well.

Another cracking gig. Looking forward to the next one, and hopefully this time I’ll be able to drag some people out with me