MiniClaire

Hi, I'd like to take an AFF course this summer when I will be travelling in Brazil, Colombia and Venezuela. Could anyone recommend a dropzone in these countries? The major limitations are that I don't speak Spanish or Portuguese, only English, and that I once attempted a static line jump but backed out at the last minute. The dropzone I did this at said that I would not be allowed to jump ever again, anywhere, full stop, although since then various people have told me this is not true- although of course individual dropzones might have a problem with this. If anyone has any recommendations of dropzones which could provide AFF teaching in English and would be unlikely to exclude me, please let me know! Claire

Thanks for the advice guys. I just assumed that the instructors knew what they were talking about (not a crazy assumption to make!) so I didn't look into it again until recently, but I will definately investigate more. I guess one of the things that made me not jump on the day was that we'd done our whole course with one guy, who was very experienced and reassuring and knew us all, but when it came to the jump he decided to be the guy on the ground, not in the plane, so the guy on the plane we'd met v briefly and he wasn't nearly as experienced (about 250 jumps compared with 4000 in the first guy), and said he hadn't been up with students that many times, which is obviously fine if you want to jump but not so reassuring if you're not sure! And when I didn't jump he had to ask the pilot what to do next because he didn't know... which didn't fill me with confidence! So there I was, looking over the door of the plane, and this virtual stranger was saying 'you'll be fine' and I was thinking 'who the hell are you?!' Anyway, I was very scared of heights at that time so maybe skydiving wasn't the best sport to try out, but since then I've been taking lessons as a pilot so that has made me a lot calmer about them- and also made me have to accept that one day I might have to jump out a plane if the piloting goes a bit wrong!

Thanks for everyone's advice... the instructor didn't say anything about it when we were in the air, he flew around again, still I didn't jump (really wish I had now!), then when we were back on the ground he told me that the brit skydiving association wouldn't insure me now so I'd never get to try again... except maybe on an AFF in another country... needless to say I was pretty surprised! If I'd known that was the case I certainly wouldn't have attempted to jump that day as I really didn't feel ready, my training had been a month ago and we'd had a really short re-fresh session, so if I'd known it was 'now or never' I would have not gone up (or maybe just grit my teeth and jumped!) Anyway maybe I should contact the brit skydiving association to ask. Tandem is a good idea, I did one last year which is what got me interested, but if I sign up for another course maybe I should do a tandem just before I start, then I'll be itching to get up there again and the nerves won't have time to kick in!

I did a RAPS course intro weekend last year, but at the end just couldn't jump, and was told that this would mean that I would never be able to take a course again, as would not be able to get insurance. Does anyone know if this is true or not? I am in the UK.

Hi, I just got back from a trip to Africa where I did a tandem jump in Swakopmund, Nambibia, and was completely blown away by the experience- first time I'd ever done something like it, and I was on a high for weeks afterward. After coming home (to London) I decided that I really wanted to jump some more, and I've been reading about how to become a qualified skydiver, but it is just so expensive! Probably not expensive when you realise what you get for the price, but as a poverty-sticken student, everything seems expensive to me! Could anyone recommend the most economical ways to learn to skydive? If it involves going to another country to do a course, then that's even better, especially somewhere exotic!! Thanks, Claire xx