Vail Valley Paragliding

I had a great time jumping off the side of a mountain with Greg Kelley of Vail Valley Paragliding last July! I was in Vail for a wedding and I wanted to do something fun with my downtime. I had never been paragliding before, and the Vail Valley Paragliding website had all of the information I needed to convince me to give it a try.
Setting up the appointment with David was very easy, although it seemed a bit strange to meet him at a gas station on the day of my jump (it turns out the landing site is kind of hard to find, and following him from the easy-​to-​find gas station worked really well). We met the instructors at the landing site, then headed up to the launch site together. Once we got up there, I was paired up with Greg, I got suited up, Greg talked to me about the jump, and we watched a few other tourists take off. Unfortunately, the wind changed directions before it was my turn to jump, and we were not able to jump. I was disappointed, but I respected the company’s commitment to safety and agreed to come back the next morning to try again.
On the second morning, we drove straight to the landing site the next morning, met Greg, then drove to the launch site. The wind cooperated this time and I was able to jump. Everything happened just the way Greg said it would, the scenery was beautiful, and flying through the sky was an incredible sensation (much to my surprise, I didn’t find any of it scary at all). Even landing was easy — except I got confused and fell over, but it didn’t hurt and I didn’t get tangled or anything. Overall, I had a great experience and I highly recommend Vail Valley Paragliding! I also recommend bringing a friend with a car who can drive you to the launch site, take some photos, and pick you up from the landing site — it just makes things easy :)

A great experience! The instructors are enthusiastic and knowledgeable. You will be safe and have a blast! Just know that if for some reason the winds are not right, your glide may not go off. These professionals will not take a chance, and that’s a very good thing! This is a must do!