Paragliding nowadays can be practiced in different ways because there is not only one way to fly but rather several:
The local flight
Take your paraglider, take off and fly in what is called the jar, We do not move too far and we always in sight take off and landing. Either we fly in thermal or dynamic ascendance or we do a splash, that is to say a flight from takeoff to landing without trying to stay in the sky. This type of flight mainly concerns paragliders of low level or rising ascents. The tandem paragliding in Annecy is a flight in one of the most beautiful "jar" that can be found in the world. At Airmax, the discovery flight in tandem paragliding is a splash of 10-15min in this famous jar.
Cross-country
This is probably the best known practice, also known as theft of distance. Climb in ascendancy to go from mountains to mountains by swallowing the kilometers. It must of course ascending conditions to achieve this type of flight, on pain of descending inexorably and coward on an unplanned landing. The riders are carefully scrutinizing the detailed forecasts of specialized weather reports to know the potential distance achievable next days. The best conditions are from April to August for these kilometer hunters and records. The latter is also 411 km in France in free distance and 564 km for the world record. A good ten hours of flight is necessary to achieve these records. The cross is also represented in competition.
On our Prestige flights, for example, we can do the little tour of Lake Annecy on a two-seater paraglider, which already represents a small cross of about twenty kilometers.
Acrobatic flight
Discipline the most spectacular paragliding because the most visual and the most fashionable. Acrobatics are nothing more than aerial freestyle, most often performed by young pilots. To be good in aerobatics, it requires a lot of training, precision and rigor to perform maneuvers where will be linked a lot of centrifugal force, weightlessness and acceleration. The equipment when it is specific, namely wings of smaller size, designed to withstand the maneuvers that causes a lot of physical and structural constraints. France in this field is very representative in international competitions.
You want to experience thrills in tandem paragliding in Annecy, these are the flights Sensation and Sensation + that you need.
Soaring
All paragliders will tell you, a small soaring session on a beautiful slope, a ridge, a cliff or a dune is the absolute foot! But what is soaring? It is playing with the wind, most often laminar, that hits a relief, ie a clear slope on a mountain, or above a ridge above a cliff or a sand dune. The best-known example is of course the Dune du Pyla on the west coast of France. The fact that this wind climbs the terrain by striking it causes a dynamic ascendancy that allows paragliders to fly without descending and play with the ground by shaving it. It's a real game and it's very addictive !!
Hike and Fly
Surely the facet of paragliding both the most natural and the most sporty. In general to join the takeoff, one takes his car or a shuttle. But those who want to deserve their flight walk first! Indeed the hike has always existed but has really democratized these last 10 years with the appearance of light equipment. Wings designed for this type of practice, walk in the mountains with its equipment in the back and then take off in wild places, mountain pastures or others.
Take off the top avoids the painful descent on foot. Normal full equipment weighs between 10 and 15 kg, while equipment for the rando flight weighs less than 5 kg, and the most extreme exists less than 1.5 kg for paragliding and harness. It is now much easier to carry your bag in the mountains and to chase the slope more quickly and thus take off where you want, as long as the flight conditions are good and the flight zones are respected.
The paragliding in Annecy is a magical place to hike on the surrounding mountains and to take off in front of the lake.
Note that all these ways of flying can be done in solo flight or tandem flight.
You will find almost all these types of flights in tandem paragliding flight in Annecy, flight Ascendance for local flight, flight Prestige for the flight cross, and flight Sensation and Sensation + for acrobatic flight.