Le Ventr’y gliss

But time passes and it doesn't fix anything... although, sometimes it questions and liberates, Sainte-Mère is the perfect example. The success story that this village festival has known for several years has ended up intriguing our two Bamboche specialists Punita and Brice.

Benoit almost slips while passing the steps of the Tourist Office... and catches himself with the nearby magnets, the hook worthy of a legendary sword (but on a fridge)! 

Brice (pushing the soap behind a brown plant) : Oula! Be careful it slips! However, you should know how to move calmly on these surfaces.  

Punita (perplexed) : I would even say more, you don't seem very stable for a slider! 

Benoît : In fact, we slide on our stomachs, hence belly-slides. 

Brice : So Ventry is not your real first name? 

Benoît : And no… The objective of our activity is to offer people, known and unknown, the chance to slide on their stomachs. It's like on a slide but without turns, fun guaranteed. 

Punita : I found it strange that so many people came to see you slide. But hey, these days we're safe from nothing. And suddenly they come to slide, so it’s a people-slide! And how many participants do you attract over that weekend? 

Benoit : Between 500 and 700 people, and each “slider” passes several times. We want everyone to have fun and not come for nothing or little. In total it's some 3500 descents! And still we refuse people. 

Brice : They go down where exactly and above all how they come back up, because as who would say the ôtr. The lower you get, the harder the hill! 

Punita : It's not Raël? 

Benoît : So we are not Raelian and yet we found a not tiring and collective method to reassemble the “sliders”. A tractor with its owner at the wheel, a trailer, and the deal is in the bag. But let's do things in order, first there is the descent. 

Brice : I have a good one! Some zinc friends can testify! 

Benoit : I'm talking about ventryglisse, or gens-glisse if you prefer... So 6 years ago, our village festival was at the bottom of the wave. In the team of volunteers we took an interest in a group of “hotheads” who organize the Madcow Festival, and on our scale we said to ourselves, we need something big, funny, entertaining and a whole a little bit extreme. The second longest ventryglisse in the world was born. 

Punita : A mad cow gave birth to a little Ventry? 

Brice : Ahahah… Holy Punita, in a way we could sum up this beautiful adventure like this. But I believe that there is a strong will, resources made available by everyone and a brigade of volunteers, am I wrong? 

Benoit : In the meantime, we mobilize 15 volunteers just for the duration of the event. As for the installation of the activity, the field in which the “sliders” launch themselves belongs to a member of the festival committee. Finally, we can count on the commitment of everyone, human and material, to carry out this vast undertaking. Succeeding in tracing 270m of ventryglisse, efficient, secure, fun and neither too fast nor not enough, requires know-how that we have acquired on the job. Two small details to give you the gist: the tarpaulin was torn off the first year with a disguise, so no more disguise; the water needed to slide is pumped directly into the pond below and runs in a closed circuit to maintain a responsible approach. 

Brice : Did you do ENSAV? 

Benoit : Eh ? 

Brice : The National School of Applied Science of Ventrygliss, formerly ENSAG (…Gens-glisse) 

Benoit : We could found it I think, we have actually acquired a good background on the issue. I take that as a compliment. 

Punita : Wonderful, and if not when is it? 

Benoit : The first or second weekend of September (date not yet decided). In short, the ventry-glisse is there two weeks before, and a little later, it requires tests and corrections so that on the big day, when it opens to the public, nothing is left to chance. During the feast of Sainte-Mère, we offer descents on Saturday and Sunday, participants pay a participation fee (€8 in 2023) and then enjoy the installation as much as they want. We limit the number of participants so that everyone can benefit. It was not conceivable to make only one pass. On average we manage to pass each person 6 or 7 times. 

Brice (tapping on his Texas Instrument Galaxy 40) : So that’s between 1.6km and 1.9km, if I round up to the nearest ten! 

Punita : Could you convert it to miles for us please? 

Brice disappeared and will never return, busy converting all the encrypted data into multiple units. 

Benoit : Come slide, you will feel like an island penguin! 

Punita : What a strange and attractive idea. To be a penguin once in your life, then to eat duck at the foot of a Medieval Castle from 1289, that has all the makings of an Ionescian prologue, I take it! 

Once again the quest for truth that drives our technicians would only have brought us a little closer to what vibrates in the heart of the Gascon, of the Gascon woman. There is something beautiful about throwing yourself headlong forward, especially at Sainte-Mère! You will see that 270 m lower, the Gers is still just as bucolic, charming and agricultural! 

Once upon a time, in a Galaxy 40, much much later! 
Brice (screaming): Between 62 and 992 inches!!!!!! 

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