PARAGLIDING TRAVEL · SEE IT FROM THE AIR
Run off the mountain. Fly.
Reviews of the best tandem paragliding flights on earth, launch by launch. Off Babadağ to the Blue Lagoon, over the lakes and the Eiger at Interlaken, beside the Annapurnas at Pokhara, off Signal Hill above Cape Town. No licence, no nerve required, just a pilot, a wing and the view of your life.
Launches with a signature
Three sites that fly like nowhere else.
A tandem flight is a thrill almost anywhere. But a two-kilometre drop off Babadağ to the Blue Lagoon, a thermal between two lakes under the north face of the Eiger, and a dawn climb beside the Annapurnas belong to those mountains alone.
Ölüdeniz, Turkey
Off Babadağ to the Blue Lagoon
No other site sends you off a 1,960-metre summit straight down to a turquoise lagoon. Jeeps grind up Babadağ to a launch ramp above the clouds; you run off into thin alpine air, then ride nearly two vertical kilometres down to Ölüdeniz beach with the Mediterranean filling the whole horizon. It is the longest descent in tandem flying, and the reason pilots from every country end up here.
- 1 Paragliding Oludeniz – Fethiye, Turkey
- 2 Oludeniz Paragliding Fethiye Turkey, Additional Features
- 3 Paragliding In Fethiye Oludeniz, Turkey
Bernese Oberland
Between Two Lakes, Under the Eiger
Interlaken sits in the gap between Lake Thun and Lake Brienz, and the only way to take in both at once is from the air. You launch off the Beatenberg ridge into thermals coming off the valley walls, bank slow circles with the north face of the Eiger filling the skyline, then float down to a landing field in the middle of town. The Alps, the way only the birds and the pilots get to see them.
- 1 Interlaken: Tandem Paragliding Flight with Pilot
- 2 Tandem Paragliding Experience from Interlaken
- 3 Tandem Paragliding Experience with Transport from Interlaken
Annapurna, Nepal
Himalayan Thermals Over Phewa Lake
Pokhara is one of the few places on earth where you thermal beside 8,000-metre peaks. Launch from Sarangkot at dawn, climb on the lift coming off the foothills with the Annapurna massif and Machapuchare hanging white above you, sometimes sharing the sky with Himalayan vultures, then spiral down to the green water of Phewa Lake. Big mountains, big air, and a view that stops conversation mid-sentence.
- 1 Paragliding
- 2 Pokhara: Adventure Paragliding Trip with Photos and Videos
- 3 Paragliding at Sarangkot Pokhara
The one everyone flies
If you only book one flight.
More travellers strap into this flight than any other on the site. The safe first booking if you have never left the ground and want to start with a sure thing.
The most-booked flights
The World’s Most Popular Tandem Flights
Ölüdeniz, Interlaken, Cape Town, Alanya, Tenerife. The flights travellers reach for first, off the launches they most want to run from at least once.
Where to take off
Pick a launch and run off it.
Fethiye for the Babadağ drop to the Blue Lagoon. Interlaken for the lakes and the Eiger. Cape Town for Signal Hill and Table Mountain. Tenerife for volcanic thermals, Pokhara for the Annapurnas, Rio for the leap off Pedra Bonita. The greatest flying sites on earth, each with the flights worth booking.
First time off a mountain
Which kind of flight are you after?
Tandem flying comes in three very different doses. Pick the one that matches your nerve, your appetite for height, and the kind of memory you want to come home with.
Interlaken, Switzerland
The Alps make sense from the air.
From the ground, Interlaken is one valley wedged between two lakes. From a wing, it is the whole Bernese Oberland at once. You launch off the Beatenberg ridge, climb on thermals coming off the slopes with the north face of the Eiger filling the skyline, then bank slow circles over the turquoise water of Thun and Brienz before floating down to a field in the middle of town. Year-round flying, and the most reliable tandem weather in the Alps.
See the best Interlaken flights →Ölüdeniz, Turkey
The flight pilots travel for.
Ölüdeniz is the world capital of tandem paragliding, and Babadağ is the reason. Jeeps haul you up a switchback road to a launch ramp at 1,960 metres, above the clouds and the cloudless coast. You run off into thin air and ride nearly two vertical kilometres down, the turquoise Blue Lagoon growing larger the whole way, before touching down on the beach itself. No other site on earth offers a descent this long, this high, with a landing this good.
See the best Fethiye flights →The best part
The ground lets go.
The best moment of any flight is the first one: a few running steps, the wing loads up overhead, and the slope drops away beneath your feet. Suddenly there is nothing under you but air, the whole landscape opens out below in one picture, the noise of the world falls quiet, and you are flying. The fear you carried to the launch is gone inside three seconds, and the next ten minutes rearrange what you thought was possible.
Browse every tandem flight →High in the Alps
The mountains are bigger from above.
There is a different kind of flying once the peaks climb past 3,000 metres. Launch under Mont Blanc at Chamonix, off the Nordkette straight above the rooftops of Innsbruck, beside the Matterhorn at Zermatt, over the lake and ridgelines at Lucerne. The thermals are stronger, the snow is closer, and the scale of what is under your wing is hard to believe until you are hanging in it.
- 1 Paragliding Tandem Flight over the Alps in Chamonix
- 2 Tandem paragliding in the Stubai Valley near Innsbruck
- 3 Chamonix: Tandem Paragliding Flight
How much air
How big do you want it?
Tandem flying runs from a calm coastal float to a near-vertical drop off a 2,000-metre summit. Pick the intensity you are after, and we will point you at the flight that owns it.
Gentle glide
Step off and float.A smooth coastal sled-ride off Signal Hill: a few steps into the wind, then a calm, steady descent with the city and the Atlantic laid out below. No experience, no nerves required.
Classic flight
Catch a thermal and stay up.The everyday magic of the sport: launch off a ridge, find the rising air, and bank slow circles over the lakes and peaks for fifteen or twenty minutes before the pilot sets you down.
Big air
Drop nearly two kilometres.The longest, highest tandem descent there is: off the 1,960-metre summit of Babadağ, with the Blue Lagoon dead ahead and the pilot free to throw wingovers and spirals if you ask for them.
Sea on one side, summit on the other
The best flying has the ocean below it.
Some of the most reliable flying on earth is where the mountains meet the coast. Tenerife’s volcanic ridges feed warm thermals all winter, with the Teide behind you and the Atlantic glittering below. You launch high, ride the sea breeze along the cliffs, and land on the beach, year-round flying weather when the Alps are socked in under snow.
See all 35 Tenerife flights →By flying site
Start with a launch you have pictured.
Fethiye for the Babadağ drop and the Blue Lagoon. Interlaken for the lakes and the Eiger. Cape Town for Signal Hill and Table Mountain. Tenerife for winter thermals. Alanya for the leap onto Cleopatra Beach. Medellín for the green Andean ridges.
By country
Where in the world are you flying?
From the cliffs of Turkey to the Swiss Alps, the volcanic ridges of Spain and the Himalayan foothills of Nepal. Pick the part of the world you are headed for and see what is in the air.
Launch to landing
How a tandem flight actually goes.
Never flown and not sure what to expect? Here is how every good tandem runs, from the ride up the mountain to the soft landing back on the ground, with nothing for you to do but enjoy it.
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