I'm toying with the idea of having a go since Mrs P won't let me go skydiving with a batsuit, strangely, she's always been happy with me cavediving. Anyhow what I'd like to know is what are the costs roughly for training and a half decent canopy and the like. Ta.
I use to but it was a while ago, I can’t remember how much training was, I did mine on the Marlborough downs it took me a couple of years to get my club license. A canopy was about four grand and you have to get it checked every few years for a airworthiness certificate.
Just unbolt your engine (4 bolts ) and hitch it up to your awning and Voila!!! Nothing else to pack* *perhaps some brown trousers and bicycle clips?
Not sure if it’s still current or available but when I was learning a good book for beginners was called touching cloudbase
My old boss was a paragliding nut. He had a big prop motor that he strapped to his back. one day he decided to go out over the sea and heard a noise, looked behind him to see the prop tumbling down into the water. Issue behind that meant he now had the dead weight of the motor as well. I think he crash landed into a pub beer garden after only making it back to land by the skin of his teeth. on another occasion he was flying a mountain in Brazil. Something went wrong and he picked a spot in what he thought was a field to land. But it was zig zagged with barbed wire. He ripped his arm open enough to be able to see all the veins and tendons etc. Two hours from a hospital he flagged down a guy on a moped who gave him a ride to this back street hospital where the stitched him up. paragliding is for idiots. He had loads of stories of near misses he’d had and people getting killed in competitions he was it. He had a young baby at the time and for the life of me I never understood how his Mrs let him do it.
The top photo is me on the south coast and the bottom one is off a friend when we were flying near the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Castle in Baveria....great place to fly. I fly without a motor (Paramotoring) both this and Paragliding (which I have done some 2006) is risky but also extremely rewarding. I usually end up with a big smile on my face
Fair play. But you definitely need your head looking at. you know you can get those views from aeroplanes? They have engines, drinks, snacks, free movies and generally a tidy little trolly dolly to serve you.
The only time I stopped to watch some chaps doing this the first one jumped off the edge, did a smart 180, smacked straight into the cliff then bumped down another 50ft or so. I'd seen enough.
We'll have to catch up some time to chat about our exploits in diving. I had a few dabbles in cave diving, but not like yours it looks like. Have to admit, I'm not too sure about wingsuits...splat
Have to say my cavediving was more like caving underwater rather than diving in a cave. Had a twin set of old one breath from death Posiodons.
5 degree water, cramped conditions at depth, sometimes trees and barbed wire in there and some death spaghetti nest of broken line in zero viz what's not to like. Was a bit too much for me in the end, hence I'm still immortal... Well so far...