Paragliding Rio De Janeiro: Off the Pedra Bonita Ramp

What this flight actually is.

This is a tandem paragliding flight over Rio de Janeiro, run by the instructor Sandro Cardoso. You are harnessed to him on one wing for the whole flight, from the run off the ramp to the landing on the sand, so no paragliding experience and no separate lesson are needed beforehand.

The booking runs to three hours in total, guided in English, Spanish, Portuguese and French, and free cancellation is offered if your plans change before the day. GoPro footage of the whole flight is included, and it is worth knowing that many tandem flights sell that footage separately rather than folding it into the booking.

On arrival you go to the flight school at the club and give your name for your appointment with Sandro Cardoso, the instructor running the flight. There is no separate check-in desk to search for beyond that, and no equipment to source yourself.

How long the booking actually runs.

Three hours is the length of the booking, not the length of the flight. The drive from the club up to the ramp takes about fifteen minutes, and the ramp itself, including the run and the flight down to the beach, takes about forty minutes.

That leaves well over two hours unaccounted for, and it goes on waiting: for the group ahead, for the car, and mostly for conditions to be right for launching. It is a real part of the day and worth planning around rather than being surprised by on the day.

The shape of the visit stays the same regardless: meet at the club, drive to the ramp, fly out and land on the sand at the beach, then return to the club afterwards. Only the length of the wait in the middle of that sequence changes from one booking to the next.

Where it launches and where it lands.

The flight starts at the Clube São Conrado de Voo Livre, the free-flight club at São Conrado, where you check in and meet the instructor. A car then takes you up through the Tijuca forest, the protected forest inside the city, to the Pedra Bonita ramp.

Pedra Bonita is the rock above São Conrado, and the ramp itself is a wooden deck built out from the hillside. The flight runs out over the forest, then down towards the coast, and it lands on the sand at São Conrado beach, with the city standing around you rather than any single landmark picked out.

After landing you are taken back to the club, which is also where the booking ends. São Conrado is the beach and neighbourhood directly below the ramp, so the whole route, up and down, stays within a short drive of where it began.

What is included, and what is not.

Transport from the club to the ramp is included, along with safety equipment and the tandem flight itself, ramp to beach. GoPro footage of the whole flight comes with the booking too, and so does use of the club's own facilities: toilets, drinking water, changing rooms and showers.

Not included are any images from the 360-degree camera, anything you buy at the club, and transport from your hotel to the club and back again. Drinking water is there for you at the club, along with the toilets, changing rooms and showers. There is also a club fee, payable on the day, which sits outside the booking and is worth knowing about before you arrive rather than at the desk.

The 360-degree camera is a separate item from the GoPro footage that is already included, so treat the two as different things rather than assuming one covers the other. The club fee works the same way: it exists, it is paid at the club rather than in advance, and knowing that before you arrive avoids any surprise on the day.

Who can go, and who cannot.

This flight is not suitable for children under 14, for pregnant women, or for anyone over 100 kg. All three limits are worth checking against your own group before booking, since a restriction discovered on the day means someone is left on the ground.

None of these limits are about ability. A first-time flyer with no experience at all can still go, provided they fall outside those three groups, since the instructor controls the wing throughout and no piloting skill is asked of the passenger.

Language is a smaller obstacle than any of those three limits. The flight is guided in English, Spanish, Portuguese and French between them, which covers most visitors arriving in Rio without needing a translator arranged in advance.

What decides whether you fly.

Conditions decide the flight, not the clock. The three-hour booking has real waiting time built into it for exactly that reason, and the drive up and the wait at the club are both part of a day that depends on the ramp being ready rather than on a fixed schedule.

Free cancellation is offered, which matters more on a flight like this than on one that always goes ahead regardless. Booking a day with room around it in your trip, rather than the one slot with nothing either side of it, is the simpler way to plan around a flight that depends on conditions.

None of that changes what the flight actually offers once conditions are right: the same run off the same ramp, out over the same forest, down to the same stretch of sand at São Conrado, whichever day it happens to fall on.