We often sit, watching in wonder, as the graceful guys and girls swoop down onto the beaches landing their paragliders with little more than a couple of steps, a quick twist of the ropes and there you have it, the canopy folds and they begin packing away, perhaps with a little adjustment to those all-important Ray Bans.

Unfortunately, today Tuesday 18th April, a Spanish pilot misjudged his approach to Velilla Beach in Almuñécar and ended up, dangling from a tree for over two hours. Fortunately he was completely unharmed (if you ignore the very painful injury to his pride), and was rescued by the fire service, assisted by a local ‘cherry picker’ driver, the Guardia Civil and Policia Local. The road was blocked during much of the rescue operation.

Unwilling to give any details to our intrepid reporter at the scene, he probably just wants the whole incident forgotten as soon as possible. But in these days of mobile phones and social media, that was never going to happen. So, trying to salvage just a little bit of his down-trodden dignity, he was removed from the tree in the ‘cherry picker’ and placed, along with his canopy, on terra firma.

The situation was made even worse for the poor chap in that, after hanging in a tree for between two and three hours, with the customers at local bars and passersby gawking and pointing, he was actually treated to a round of applause when he finally reached the ground, accompanied by shouts of “do it again, we missed it!”

Oh, by the way, when we say ‘intrepid reporter’ we mean our mate Robbie Medina, the proprietor of El Faro in Almuñecar… purveyor of an excellent and reasonably priced Sunday roast, meals, snacks, beers and wines. Pop in and partake of some tasty food and drink, whilst congratulating him on his photos. If you pop in after 8pm you might even catch his son Matt awake!