Offers of Paramotoring Cornwall

Paramotoring could be described as backpacking in the air. Just as your rucksack contains all your necessary belongings when you’re travelling, this activity involves putting everything you need for flight on your back. The equipment then returns the favour by carrying you into the air! This sport combines the simplicity of paragliding with the self-sufficiency that a small engine and propeller offer, meaning that you can fly on your terms, without waiting for the wind to blow in the right direction. It’s perfect for enjoying clear skies and breathtaking views, and we can’t think of a better place to find these than the southwestern tip of England, Cornwall.

The landscape here is dominated by the coast, which almost completely surrounds the county. The waters of the English Channel to the south and the Celtic Sea have carved out a stunning coastline here, where long expanses of golden sand alternate with high cliffs, rocky promontories and rugged peninsulas. Seabirds of all shapes and sizes soar above the shore, and you can join them by taking to the air with the help of a paramotor, as a passenger or by training to become a pilot yourself. Save your money on aeroplane tickets and experience flying like never before here in this area!

Where are the best places to go paramotoring in Cornwall?

One of the advantages of this activity over paragliding or hang-gliding is that you don’t need a hill with a reliable prevailing wind in order to get airborne. It’s useful to have ground installations nearby when you’re training, but launching a paraglider is possible in many different places for an experienced pilot. We’ve listed some of the most popular launch sites below, as well as the best place for learning to fly.

• Davidstow Airfield: This is the paramotoring training hub of Cornwall. It’s an old RAF installation, and you can rest assured that the MOD chose their airfield locations carefully. Visibility, reliable weather conditions and an absence of tall objects in the immediate area make this a fantastic place to learn to fly. But that’s not all. Davidstow is just outside Camelford, perfectly situated between Bodmin Moor and the north Coast. Whether you want to overfly Cornwall’s largest wilderness area, or explore the dramatic cliffs and caves around Tintagel, you can be there in no time, travelling as the crow flies by paramotor.

• St Ives Bay: The town of St Ives is famous for its natural beauty, and has tempted some of the country’s best artists away from London with its stunning scenery and enchanting natural light. As luck might have it, there are some suitable places to launch a paraglider into the air in the area. St Ives Bay is a wide bay to the east of the town, ringed with sandy beaches and gentle headlands, and it’s here that Carbis Bay and Leland, two locations that are popular among paramotorists, are found. Once in the air, a panorama reveals itself, with the coast beyond St Ives narrowing to the the tip of the Land’s End peninsula.

• Perranporth: There's a wonderful stretch of coastline around Perranporth that’s a pleasure to behold from the air. From the St Agnes Heritage Coast to the beautiful surfing beaches around Newquay, you’ll never get tired of paramotoring here.

• St Austell: One of the best places for paramotoring on the south coast of Cornwall is Vault Beach, where white sands lie below dark cliffs, and charming fishing villages such as Megavissey are tucked into the folds of the coastline. To the south, the next land is Brittany in northwestern France.

Options for organising an experience

- Strapping a propeller to your back and flying under a paragliding wing is a liberating, rewarding activity, but it’s also quite hard to get right. We recommend that the first time you experience this innovative way of flying is as a passenger on a tandem flight. An experienced pilot will take care of the details - planning, launch location selection, equipment checks - while you focus on enjoying the views of the coast and landscape. If you sign up for a tandem flight, you can choose 30 or 60 minutes of airtime. With a cruising speed of 15 to 40 miles per hour, a paramotor can take you on quite a journey in this time.

- If you’ve been a passenger - and loved it - and now you want to become a pilot, you need to get on a course. There are 1 day training courses available, which are a kind of taster of what this sport involves. But to get to the point of flying confidently and independently, you need to complete several days of training with study sessions on the ground. The good news is that, learning to fly in Cornwall, you can explore different areas as you become more skillful, and you’ll struggle to find a better place to fly once you’ve completed the course! As well as full training courses, there are also conversion courses on offer for those who know how to fly a paraglider or paraglider, and want to learn how to incorporate powered flight into their skillset.

Requirements to do this activity

It’s easy to think that flight of any kind is an exclusive activity, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. The flying clubs and schools are made up of people with a burning passion for their chosen forms of flying, and they want to share that with the world. If you’re keen to try it, you have no need to worry about demonstrating previous experience or anything else to be given a warm welcome. Of course, you don’t need your own equipment either, as this will all be supplied.

The only requirements that you need to meet in order to take a trip in a paramotor in Cornwall are the following: be at least 16 years old, be able to run 50 metres at a reasonable pace (this is necessary at take off and landing) and be up for it!

Are you ready for take off? Don’t hesitate to book with us!