How Much Does It Cost?
Thursday, November 10, 2011 at 20:09 Melissa Hope When we go to the park to kite our paragliders, we get a lot of questions. People want to know if we've just landed from somewhere ("we wish"), if we're sky drivers ("nope"), what's in our harness ("mostly air; it serves as an additional layer of protection for our backs"), and why we're doing what we're doing ("practicing ground handling makes us safer on the launch and in the air"). One of the most common questions is how much the equipment costs.
I can give them a rough breakdown of the cost of the paraglider, the reserve system, the harness, and the lessons, which does add up to a bit of an intimating sounding number. But do not cheap out on the equipment or classes; they are keeping you safe.
My partner, Russ, and I bought all our equipment and our P2 course together; doing it all at once for two people made for quite the bill. But, as I always tell those people in the park, paragliding is the least expensive way to become a pilot, and it is an incredible bargain to gain the ability to fly. To get to glide through the air at 3000 feet, just you and your wing and the wind (and sometimes a beautiful bird or two), is worth every penny you will spend and then some.
After Russ and I made our big purchase, we went out to get the other equipment a paragliding pilot needs: a helmet, gloves, and boots with good ankle support. The first two were pretty straight forward: go into a skateboarding store and pick the right size for your head, then go to a hardware store for a couple of leather gloves. Done. The last though... there are a lot of choices out there for boots. And we did a silly thing: we cheaped out. We went to a bargain shoe store. Our only excuse is that we'd spent so much money so quickly, and this was something we felt we could control the budget for. Mistake!
If you've already spent over $4000.00 on lessons alone for two people, plus equipment, saving $100 on boots is silly. Also, it is a waste of money. See, one of the first things we did with our new wings was go to an early morning slope soaring session to practice our launches.
Early morning means dew. The grass on that hill is wet. And within half an hour of being out there, our feet were wet too.
From the training hill, we were off to the mountain. No time to go home and change; we were going paragliding in soaked socks all day.
The next day that we weren't flying, we went to an outdoor specialty store and bought better boots. I highly recommend Gore-Tex; my feet are dry no matter what. And those cheap boots that got worn once sit in the back of my closet.
Another reason to invest in good boots: Once you are comfortable paragliding, you will be almost lying down in your harness, which means a common photo from a helmet camera looks like this:
If your boots are going to be all over FaceBook, they might as well be nice.
Reader Comments (2)
Nice boots, Melissa!
That's fun! Yes, I'll make sure my boots are that nice next time.